Finding Peace
by BookishGal
Summary: Follows "Breaking Free" and "Playing House." As Clarice Starling makes decisions about the right direction for her life, Hannibal Lecter finds patience and self-control can be difficult things indeed. Rated M for language, violence and sexual situations.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note:** This is a direct sequel to my earlier story "Playing House"; it's the third story in the series that started with "Breaking Free." The events begin in October 1993, just over three months after the final scene of "Playing House."

A bit of a warning about the timeline for this story: Hannibal and Clarice start off traveling on separate paths, so events are not occurring simultaneously. I'm hopeful that the transition cues will be clear.

I find reader responses immensely fascinating, so if you like or dislike anything in particular as you're reading, please drop me a note via the review option or PM. If you have PMs enabled for replies, you'll personally receive my grateful thanks – and probably some babbling as well. ;-)

Finally, thanks are owed to fellow Lecterphile lovinghannibal, who provided lovely assistance with the nuances of Italian. Thanks, LH! As always, all mistakes are my own.

**Disclaimer:** Nothing is mine but the use of these particular words in this particular order. Everything else goes home to its proper copyright owner at last call.

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><p>Hannibal Lecter was not, strictly speaking, an insane man. Nor was he a foolish one.<p>

But he was, in fact, a man in love - a condition known to mimic both states.

And at the moment, he was a man sifting through an uncountable number of variables, trapped on an airplane, unable to force it to bring him more swiftly to Clarice's side. The newscast had provided little information regarding her injuries, but the pain in her voice had been evident as they played a portion of her emergency call. The family of the recovered child, of course, had been media darlings, the father stoic and red-eyed, the mother sobbing and grateful for the FBI operation that had saved their daughter's life.

The child herself had not made any appearance beyond the images from the scene captured by a quick-on-its-feet local news organization that must have arrived simultaneously with the ambulance - quickly enough to enjoy international fame from its brief footage of the barefoot girl in a tattered white nightgown plastered to Clarice's side, face tucked into Clarice's neck, weight supported by Clarice's arms, refusing to be pulled away even as medical technicians attempted to assess injuries on them both and fresh blood streamed from an indeterminate wound in Clarice's side. The child appeared filthy and frightened, yes, but it was Clarice who drew the viewer's eye, coated as she was in drying blood.

Her face, her hair, what he could see of her neck and shirt alongside the little girl - she seemed to have showered in it. Presumably it belonged to one of the other agents who had entered the home with her or the pedophilic killer who had resided inside; were it hers, she would not have been standing at all, certainly not bearing the child's weight. If it belonged to a single donor, that man was, without question, dead. The question was how Clarice had come to be covered in his blood, and what damage had been done to her in return.

And those answers... those answers he could not determine until he could see her and speak with her. And that he could not do until the plane touched down and he had ascertained a safe method of reaching her hospital room. It galled.

He schooled himself to patience, reviewing again what knowledge he currently possessed and spinning out threads of possibility. He would need to be prepared for every eventuality.

* * *

><p>On the morning of the day before Hannibal Lecter sat on a plane and contemplated her injuries, Clarice Starling rode in the back seat of an FBI-issue SUV and listened to Senior Field Agent Nelson Humphries complain about their current assignment. Beside him, eager rookie Chris Gebb drove the car and nodded in agreement with everything the senior agent said.<p>

_Shoot me now._

"Pointless waste of time, if you ask me," Humphries proclaimed for the third time since they'd left the Omaha field office behind. "Locals say it's been abandoned a long while now, and we can't confirm anything beyond that once upon a time some distant cousin owned it. We're more likely to see snow in July than come upon anything useful at this old farm shack."

Clarice was not going to make the mistake of again suggesting it was important to be thorough, not after the ear-blistering nonsense she'd gotten back the first two times. She tipped her head to look out the window, picturing not the stubby post-harvest fields waiting for someone to come along and turn them under but instead an enormous pile of paperclips. _Best damn paperclip sorter in the Bureau, Doctor._ She stifled her sigh. _You were right. I think I've had about all the time and distance I can take. And I think… if I could still be useful, still make a difference for the lambs… I could learn to accept the rest. It probably won't be easy, but nothing worthwhile ever is, right?_

"Christ, Starling, you falling asleep back there or what?" Humphries had twisted to look at her. "Thought you were supposed to be some kind of tight-assed professional. Or is sleeping on the job a perk of being Jack Crawford's little… protégé?"

His eyes crawled over her, and she burned at the implication.

"You want me to tell you again that you're not taking this seriously enough, Agent Humphries? Fine. I reiterate: You're not taking this seriously enough. A little girl is missing. She could be dead already. If she is, he'll take another one in ten to fourteen days. Maybe you don't give a shit about this little girl or the next one. But finding this guy and saving that little girl is _all_ I care about right now."

"Maybe that's why _you_ think you're here – but we all know this bullshit assignment is just old man Crawford throwing a bone to his _very special_ agent." He smirked at her. "So just shut your mouth and do what you're told. Don't worry, honey; I'm sure he'll find a way to praise you anyway."

Gebb was watching her with wide eyes in the rearview mirror, and no wonder; he was from the local office out of Omaha, so fresh he squeaked, and clearly hadn't heard all the gossip yet.

Her brain nagged insistently, and she nearly ignored it in favor of the rage rapidly climbing her spine, except for one thing: It was the doctor's voice, calm and methodical, and his was the voice she could never ignore.

_Maturity brought with it the realization that restrained menace was often more effective in dealing with bullies._

She relaxed back into her seat and smiled. It unsettled Humphries, she noted. Gebb was still watching her in the rearview.

"Eyes on the road, Agent Gebb." She spoke gently, with only a hint of chiding in her tone. "We still need to get to this 'bullshit assignment' in one piece."

Humphries was watching her warily now. _So you're not entirely obtuse? Good for you, jackass._

"I'm at a loss, Agent Humphries. See, I can't figure out how you could be so stupid."

His eyes widened; his nostrils flared. Yeah, he was pissed now.

"You want to say that again, Starling?"

"Did you misunderstand me the first time, Agent Humphries? Was I in any way unclear?"

"You're begging for a reprimand in your jacket, Starling."

"I don't beg." _Not for you._ "And I really don't think that's how this is going to shake out."

"You don't think so? _You_ don't? I'm the one in charge here, Starling. And you're being insubordinate."

"Sure, you're in charge. But you've already given your opinion of me… and you think I'm either a hard-nosed bitch or Jack Crawford's whore. So if I were either of those things, what do you think I'd do to the jackass who mouthed off about it and sexually harassed me? No, don't bother answering; I can see you're having trouble following along.

"If I'm a hard-nosed bitch, Humphries, then I file a report. A long, detailed report of every unwelcome advance, every put-down, every improper comment. Sure, we both get caught up in an internal investigation then, but I'm a straight arrow, and I want things done by the book. You, maybe, not so much.

"But if I'm Jack Crawford's whore, you're in an even worse situation, aren't you? Because now I'm going to go running back to him and complain about big bad Humphries and his mean old comments. And what do you think Mr. Crawford will do to you then, once he knows the kind of rumors you're spreading about him? He has a wife to consider, you know. You think _this_ is a shit assignment, imagine what you'll be begging for then.

"Are you sure you want to continue down that path, Agent Humphries? Wouldn't it be better just to stop now and chalk the whole thing up to a misunderstanding?"

"You fucking bitch." He was furious; of that, she had no doubts. His face was tinged red, and the cords of muscle stood taut along his neck.

"Now you're just being rude." Her grin spread wide as the plains they crossed. Humphries was Behavioral Science; he knew the cases she had worked. He would know, surely, whom she imitated now. And if he believed those rumors, too… well. He might expect she could call upon assistance from that quarter. "And I hate rude people."

There was a glimmer of recognition on his face, a trace of fear that rolled up and over him. He twisted back around in his seat to face forward without another word.

Clarice's heart pounded.

_That was fun._

Deeper in her mind, a familiar rumbling voice replied.

_Mmm. Quite._

Silence reigned for the next forty-five minutes, until Gebb slowed the car and turned into a dirt-and-gravel drive.

"I, uh, I think this is the place."

A two-story farmhouse stood – well, more like leaned, Clarice thought – at the end of the lane; a weathered barn sat back and to the right. Gebb pulled the car into the wide open area in front of the house. A rusted sedan – a 1965 Ford Galaxie, if Clarice knew her cars – sat alongside the house, looking as though it had spent all of the intervening years in this lonely spot, exposed to the elements.

Gebb hopped out of the car eagerly; Humphries, clearly bored with the whole endeavor, took his time. Clarice stepped out and surveyed the landscape. Colfax County, Nebraska. Rural even by her standards; she couldn't see another farmhouse in any direction, and the land was so flat that her gaze ate up miles. It wasn't at all the hilly, cozy rural of West Virginia or the reassuring shadow of mountains that lay over Montana. She felt as exposed and vulnerable as the Ford looked.

"What a dump!" Humphries, having made his pronouncement, approached the rickety porch. "Gebb, get on over here so we can get this done and get the hell back to civilization."

Clarice's eyes slid from the Galaxie toward the barn. Something was odd. What was it? The dirt and gravel… it had been disturbed, though she couldn't say how recently. _Could've been local kids doing doughnuts and scaring themselves with ghost stories at the old abandoned farm._

Plenty of ruts crisscrossed the area in front of the barn. Most had a thin layer of standing water in them; it had obviously rained recently. But one set … one set of tracks did not. A set of tracks that ended at the barn door.

"I think somebody's living here," Clarice hissed, jogging over to the porch to catch her colleagues before they could enter. "And they would've seen and heard us coming from a ways off in this landscape. See the tracks from—"

"Relax, Starling. It's an abandoned shack with a rusted-out car, and we wouldn't even be out here 'investigating' it as a lead if you hadn't stuck your nose in a case that didn't belong to you. Again." Agent Humphries pushed on the front door, which hung nearly off its hinges. "See? Door's open. What does your—"

The boom of the shotgun reached Clarice's ears a fraction of a second after the pellets sprayed through the door, sending metal and splinters into Humphries' chest and face. A pity, she thought; if he had been a taller man, the family might have managed an open casket. As it was, no amount of stitching or makeup or mortician's art would make him look like a man again.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's note:** For reviewer Kathleen, and anyone else interested in her question about the posting schedule, I've left a detailed explanation on my profile page. (Likely more detailed than anyone cares to know.) And now, on with the story.

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><p>No squat, inelegant, bureaucratic building had ever looked so lovely to Hannibal Lecter as the airport in Omaha, Nebraska.<p>

Already he – or, rather, Thomas Clark, unassuming American dealer in rare books returning from the Frankfurt Book Fair – had traveled from Frankfurt to New York City, endured a rather cursory customs inspection, boarded a connecting flight to Chicago where he boarded yet another connecting flight, and finally – finally – arrived in the city where Clarice presumably now lay in a hospital bed. He had left Frankfurt before lunch Friday, mere hours after the 90-second segment on CNN's international broadcast had alerted him to her misadventure, and it was now nearly midnight in Nebraska.

Despite the late hour, his body's natural inclination was to seek out the breakfast it ought to have been receiving. The amenities at the mid-size airport, however, fell into two categories: those that were unappetizing and closed, and those that were unappetizing and open. The doctor passed by without a second glance.

After fourteen hours aboard various airplanes, it was exceedingly delightful to stretch his legs. With his carryon bag hoisted over his shoulder, he proceeded through the motions with a calm, pleasant demeanor overtop the core of urgent demand that pressed him to hurry, to verify for himself that Clarice yet lived.

He collected his checked suitcase. He obtained keys to a vehicle from the lightly staffed rental counter, leaving the rental term open-ended, as he did not yet know how long he might spend with Clarice. He left the terminal and located his BMW sedan, the only suitable selection amid the sea of drab American economy choices – the Taurus, the Accord, the Camry. He headed downtown to the Magnolia Hotel, where he had made a reservation during his layover after exiting customs in New York.

He had not anticipated finding luxury; five-star hotels were not thick on the ground in the American Midwest, and he could hardly ask that Clarice be moved to a hospital more conveniently located… perhaps Rome, or Paris, or Berlin? Even Toronto might suit. Somewhere far from the watchful eyes of Jack Crawford and the suffocating embrace of the FBI.

But the Magnolia, even should it prove less than perfect, was amusing in other ways. It purported to be built in imitation of the Florentine Bargello, a museum the doctor had visited – a museum that had, centuries before, served as a prison… and, centuries before that, housed the Council of the Hundred in which Dante himself had defied the Catholic Church with a scathing, blunt response: _Nihil fiat_.

"Let nothing be done," he murmured, after the young porter had deposited the doctor's bags, accepted his compensation with grace, and departed, closing the door behind him. "Would that you could so vehemently repudiate Uncle Jack's requests, Clarice."

He would rest and refresh himself before attempting to assess the possibilities for accessing her hospital room without attracting attention, but… yes, there was little danger in making a preliminary inquiry now. The phone beckoned, its accompanying yellow pages obligingly providing the number for the University of Nebraska Medical Center where the news reports indicated Clarice had been taken.

Hospital staff picked up after two rings; a pleasant, feminine voice reached his ear.

"University of Nebraska Medical Center; if this is an emergency, please hang up and dial 911."

"Non-emergency, thank you."

"And how may I direct your call, sir?"

"I wish to inquire about the condition of a patient. Clarice Starling."

"Hold for a moment please, sir."

"Of course."

The phone played music in his ear. It was not a piece he recognized; it was quite pedestrian. It was interminable.

"Sir?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you for holding. I'm afraid we're only able to give limited information about Agent Starling's condition; the FBI has issued a blanket restriction on visitors and inquiries because of the media attention. Are you a member of the media, sir?"

"Merely a concerned citizen. I thought I might have flowers delivered to her room; I saw the news coverage of her courageous actions to save the young girl. She deserves to know how many people are wishing her well, wouldn't you say?"

"I'm afraid I can't give out her room number, sir, but I can tell you that Agent Starling is recovering from surgery and her prognosis is good. If you'd care to call back during regular business hours, the gift shop will be able to accommodate your request to send flowers without requiring a patient room number."

"Thank you so much for your assistance."

"You're welcome, sir. Is there anything else I can help you with tonight?"

"Not at all."

"Alright, then. You have a good night, sir."

"You as well. Ta-ta."

He returned the phone to its cradle, satisfied that Clarice had survived the day, at least. He would find a way to see her in person and check her condition himself before another day had passed. For now, though, he would sleep. Perhaps his dreams would bring him more pleasant thoughts of his Starling. He had not dared sleep in transit; aside from the vulnerability of sleeping amid strangers, he had found the image of Clarice's bloodied, blank face gazing back at him each time he closed his eyes.

But here, in the safe anonymity of his hotel room, he completed his evening routine and slipped between the sheets, pushing aside the unwelcome image and stepping back into memory to conjure a more pleasant one. The transition from waking to sleeping passed unremarked, the remembered weight of Clarice Starling sprawled atop him warming him from head to foot as he slept.

* * *

><p>Clarice hit the faded boards of the porch to the left of the door, hoping the half-rotting structure would hold her weight, laid out flat, gun pulled and ready in her right hand. She risked a glance back, rolling up on her side; Agent Gebb had crouched below the window to the right of the door.<p>

He jerked his head toward the car.

"We oughta run for it," he whispered across the space. Or maybe he shouted; the blast was still sounding in Clarice's skull. "Get the hell out, call for backup."

She shook her head. If their target was here, maybe so was the girl. If they backed off now, he'd just kill her like he'd done the others. Maybe he'd be caught or killed after; maybe he'd get away clean. Either way, the girl would be dead. And there was no way in hell five-year-old Maggie Ludhin was going to end up like the girl before her. Nothing could scrub the image of that tiny body from Clarice's mind.

_Set it aside, Clarice. You've work to do, hmm? Time to save your lamb again. If you manage to keep this one alive, do you think then that your father and Uncle Jack will finally be proud of you?_

She flinched, almost imperceptibly, as the doctor's dry voice echoed. Shaking it off, Clarice impatiently gestured toward the house. Gebb shook his head and darted down the steps past Humphries' body, running for the SUV that had carried them to this place.

Rage and betrayal rushed through her like a river high with the spring thaw. When a bullet shattered the front window above her – and, from the scream and the heavy thud, likely Gebb's femur as well – she silently thanked him for his idiocy as she used the distraction to dive into the house through the front door. No shotgun blast accompanied her movement; the trigger on that trap must have been a one-off.

She caught a glimpse of the shooter behind a wall that seemed to divide a living room in the front of the house from a dining room in the rear. He was shooting again, but not at her. She clipped him high and right where he was just barely visible from her angle – collarbone, maybe, neck if she was lucky, bicep if she wasn't – and his rifle clattered to the dull wood floor. Too late for Gebb, if the second round the shooter'd gotten off had hit its mark; from the sudden lack of screaming outside, she presumed it had.

"FBI! Show me your hands!"

A hand zipped out from behind the wall, but it wasn't in surrender. Clarice sent two warning shots at the rifle's stock as she stepped swiftly to her left, seeking a better view around the wall. The movement would leave her more exposed, but she couldn't chance him getting a hand on the gun again.

It was a familiar weapon, a near-match to her daddy's old Remington 760 – probably the newer 7600. A deer hunter's weapon, the sort anyone could walk into a sporting goods store and buy without a permit or a background check. Pump action, easy for operation with either hand. Four-cartridge load, thirty-aught-six if it was like Daddy's.

_Next year, pumpkin, I'll take you along with me an' we'll bring home a nice fat buck. _

_Promise?_

_Sure as eggs is eggs._

Daddy had been dead before hunting season came around again.

"Reach for it again an' I blow that fucking hand off! Now show me your goddamned hands!"

She crossed further into the living room. The edge of a boot was just visible from behind the dining room wall. Then fingertips, moving out from behind the wall.

Another step, her shoes thudding on the hardwood floor. Blue denim. Bent legs.

"Stand up, slowly, and step out."

Another step. Legs uncurling.

And then the mistake: It was the tiniest startle reflex, the most minute change in her stance, the slightest shift in her gaze, as glass shattered behind her. A piece of the shattered pane falling, she realized, but it was too late.

He had already charged her, head down like a bull, her reflexive trigger pull sending bullets into the wall above him and then up into the ceiling as he drove her back. Her spine hit the wall with enough force to push the air from her lungs and rattle her from head to toe. Her left hand lost its supportive grip; it was only her right on the gun now, as she tried to angle it down and into his shoulder.

He pulled her forward and slammed her back again. Her skull bounced from the impact; a bullet skipped harmlessly over his back and into the floor. Her index finger tightened again, automatically.

Click.

_Fuck. _

A speedy grip reversal had her bringing the butt of the gun down on his shoulder instead – the right one, where blood showed through the tear in his shirt. _First shot was barely more than a graze. Sonovabitch! _

He howled when she struck him, though: Once, twice, three times and a fourth before he managed to grab her jacket hard enough to yank her off her feet. She kicked her leg off the wall, aiming to boot him in the balls, but he swung her around and heaved.

Then she was flying, her flight cut short by the adjacent wall before she could tuck and roll. Her gun kept going, pitched into the dining room; her eyes, tracking it, fell on something much nearer – the discarded rifle.

She lunged.


	3. Chapter 3

Clarice: bloody, begging, her eyes burning with accusation.

The contentment the doctor had savored as he slipped into sleep had not lingered into the morning; no, his dreams had turned around on themselves until memory and manipulation merged into horrors matched only by childhood experience.

She bled from wounds he could not find. She grasped his wrist and drove the Harpy at her throat deep into her neck. She closed him in a glass box and went willingly to Jack Crawford, who smirked as he thrust a blade into her back. And always, always, her dead, unblinking eyes watched him.

That he could not purge the images from his mind was a personal failing, he felt, as he made his way to the hospital gift shop. The foggy morning, with its slight drizzle, made his gabardine and fedora unremarkable, if perhaps a touch unusual, amid the crowd of colorful late fall attire and drab barn coats in the lobby.

Her eyes haunted him as he selected one of the gaudy, obnoxious gift baskets from the shelf, a nightmare of neonatal neutrality, greens and yellows in many and varied combinations. The selection was immaterial but for its single redeeming feature: the floppy stuffed lamb at its center.

He tucked it under his arm and carried it to the register. The clerk had been watching him browse; he nodded politely as he approached her.

"I'd like to have this delivered, please."

"Of course, dearie. Who's the recipient?"

"Starling. Clarice Starling."

The woman behind the counter scrutinized him from beneath heavy brows and a well-wrinkled forehead. She might have been handsome in her youth.

"The FBI agent? The one as rescued little Maggie Ludhin?"

"Yes, that's right." His lips twitched in amusement. "She's a colleague."

"You work with her?" He had risen in her estimation, it seemed; her eyes softened.

"Not recently, no, but we've collaborated on previous assignments." Well, that was true enough, he thought, though it did rather leave out the crucial information.

"She everything the papers say about her?"

"I couldn't possibly venture a guess about the extent of the media's truthfulness, madam, but I can assure you that Agent Starling is an uncommonly dedicated and virtuous woman."

The clerk looked at the basket he'd chosen and raised an eyebrow.

"And you're getting her _this_? Oh, honey, you know that's for babies and new mamas, dontcha?" She pointed to the refrigerated case behind her, her fingers slightly bent, knuckles swollen. Arthritis, he expected. "We've got roses and whatnot back here. I'm thinking a mix of white and red would get your message across a little better. Can't no woman mistake _their _meaning."

Hmm. He supposed what the clerk must see as his seeming infatuation had colored his tone rather obviously. It would be ridiculous to plead that their relationship was merely professional in nature; what's more, he did not wish to do so. Allowing that the clerk was correct would not make him stand out any more than Clarice's other colleagues, some of whom - _Jack Crawford, perhaps?_ - surely held a torch. He refrained from curling his lip at the thought.

"I had five brothers and two sons," the clerk continued, without waiting for his reply. "I think I know that pole-axed look on a young man's face well enough."

"Yes, well." The doctor smiled pleasantly, encouragingly. "Let the other young men bring her roses. This monstrosity is something of a private joke."

The woman grinned back at him, and she was, for a moment, quite beautiful in her joy. "Oh, you're a clever fellow. Know her better than the rest of the riff-raff, do you? I'm sure she'll love it, then."

She rang up the transaction, and he paid in cash.

"Did you want to write something on the card, dear?"

The clerk had filled out her portion of the slip, and she now turned it and pushed it across the counter to him. Tempting, but dangerous if anyone were to see it. No, he would save his words and deliver them in person.

"No, thank you. She'll know who sent it."

As he now knew where she resided. In the corner of the tag, alongside the line bearing Clarice's name, the clerk had written the information he fervently desired: Rm. 254.

* * *

><p>In the arched opening to the dining room of a rundown farmhouse, desire and action merged when Clarice's hand fell on the rifle. She snatched it up as she rolled, pumping to eject the shell and chamber the next round. Swinging the barrel forward, she saw a denim blob moving toward her and scrambled backward, heels finding little purchase on the old wood floor.<p>

His weight dropped on her with crushing force before she could bring the weapon to bear on him. Their forearms collided in a wrestling match for control. Clarice pulled the trigger, sending a round through the underside of the dining room table. Better to waste it than face it from the wrong end.

Shattering glass assaulted her already ringing ears; a glance back over her head proved it was more than a window this time. The round must have gone through the table and into the glass-fronted hutch on the far wall; it rained glassware and china, and shards skittered across the floor toward her unprotected face.

One of her legs finally came free from under his; she slammed her foot into the side of his knee and felt something pop. He screamed. They rolled together into a table leg; it thumped and shuddered. The roll had brought her into a superior position, but his hands still covered hers on the rifle, squeezing down so hard that she couldn't let go.

The force bent her arm, caused her hand to move the slide, pumping the rifle, the skin of her fingers pinching and tearing in the mechanism even as it ejected the spent shell and chambered the next. His left index finger wedged itself in beside her right, depressing the trigger. More china shattered behind them.

"Last shot, bitch." He sprayed her face with spittle as he spoke, his face tight with pain.

"Where's the girl, Leonard?"

"Dead." He laughed.

"Bullshit." She needed to get her hands free. The rifle was no more than a blunt weapon now. He outweighed her by fifty pounds of solid muscle. She needed to put him down and put him down _hard_.

… _a more definitive display of force … _

A snippet of memory in the doctor's voice.

She leaned her weight hard on his injured leg, gratified by the sharpness of his next breath.

"Tell me where she is, and I'll make the pain stop."

He laughed again, and she ground her knee into his until the laughter became a series of choking sobs. But his hands clamped down harder on hers. She could feel every edge and groove of the slide and the trigger etching into her skin.

"I make that promise, too," he whispered. "You should see their sweet, trusting faces. And then their pain stops _forever_."

She knew her revulsion was plain on her face; she could feel her lips curling and stretching. And then she felt his other leg win the battle between them, coming up and over her own, and she knew what came next. They rolled sideways and rolled again.

His hands finally loosened as he banged an elbow into the floor, and she cracked the length of the rifle into his chin before he ripped it from her and tossed it aside. She hadn't had distance, or force, or leverage on her side; had she had a bit more of any or all of the three, she might've succeeded in knocking him out.

Instead, he shook it off as they rolled a third time, emerging on the far side of the table. Shards from the broken hutch and its contents dug into her back through her thin jacket. Their roll ended at the hutch itself, her back slamming against it hard enough to send more broken bits raining down. It must've been solid wood; the feet didn't so much as twitch from the collision.

"If the girl's dead, then so are you, Leonard." Fury kept her voice steady as she struggled to free herself from his grip.

"You think you're gonna send me to the chair, Miz F-B-I?" He shook her against the base of the hutch. "Bzzzzt! Nighty-night?"

He'd spend years on Nebraska's death row waiting for that moment, she knew. Longer than Maggie Ludhin had been alive, if he'd truly already killed her. How was that justice?

_Is it justice, Clarice, or merely society's attempt to civilize what cannot be civilized? What law but survival matters here? Whose judgment but yours? He has harmed the lambs, has he not? Judge him accordingly._

"I think I'll send you straight from here to the morgue if she's dead, Leonard. So think real hard. Where is she?"

She caught it this time – the immediate, involuntary flick of his eyes toward the next room. The girl was here. She was alive. And Clarice had a direction now, a purpose. She just needed to break his hold and get through that doorway.

"Thank you, Leonard." She smiled at him, a smile that said she was smarter than him. A smile that said he was an amusement to her, no more important as a person than those dead little girls had been to him. "You've been so very helpful."

As Agent Humphries had in the car, her opponent obliged her with an instinctive rage response, releasing his hold on her jacket with one hand to press his arm against her throat instead.

"Shut up! You won't look peaceful at all, you fucking bitch, you'll die like a fish flopping on the bank. Gasp for air, bitch. Fucking beg me for it!"

His ranting went on, but Clarice wasn't listening. She was moving, bringing her elbows together, raising a foot, ignoring the pressure on her throat and the desperate desire to breathe.

When she erupted into motion, lungs burning, it was to slam her elbows into his solar plexus, throwing him back, and to stomp her foot once more against his injured knee. _Find a weakness. Exploit it._

Satisfaction. She sucked air in and watched him try and fail. He'd be fine in a minute when the nerve spasm stopped, but for now…. She closed her hands into a single fist and walloped him in the face, feeling his cheekbone give under the force of it. He lay motionless.

She pulled herself up and went looking for the girl, who might need medical attention – and deserved it far more than the man at her feet.

An annoying blur invaded her vision as she stood. Her head throbbed. She tried to focus on the open doorway, beyond which looked to be a kitchen. _Oh. That makes sense. Kitchens are… food… and… table here… and… girl. Find the girl._

She moved with only a slight unsteadiness, though lights occasionally flashed in her peripheral vision. She stopped turning to look; they disappeared before she could catch them.

_Concussion, Clarice. Are you certain—_

"Not _now_, Doctor!" Even his usually soothing voice made her head throb. The pounding grew louder.

The kitchen wasn't in much better shape than the other rooms, dusty and coated in a grimy film – but dark garbage bags blocked the windows, and the door in the far corner, a pantry or basement, maybe, looked… fresher. Cleaner.

At the bottom sat a deadbolt, which she toed open. And just above her eye level, where Leonard-the-bastard would see it perfectly, hung a padlock.

_Why padlock the pantry, Leonard? And where's…._

A key ring. Two, her eyes told her. No. One. One on a hook on the wall not a foot from the door. _Weren't expecting company, were you? Cocky son of a bitch._

Clarice was reaching for the key when the flicker of movement entered her vision. Not a disappearing sparkly light. _Shit._

She turned as it lurched into her – as _he_ lurched into her – and cursed as she realized that the thumping in her head had been equal parts concussion and limping footsteps. The two of them dropped to the floor.

_The doctor would have made sure of him before looking for the girl._

_Yes. But you did not. Mind the knife now, Clarice._

_The what?_

The fall tangled them together, and it was sheer luck – and the doctor's timely mental intervention – that brought her own arm up to block Leonard's as it descended. He did, indeed, hold a knife, left-handed; its partially serrated edge flashed past her face.

She grabbed his wrist in both hands, pushing outward and up, and blinked at his blurry face above her. _Shit, focus!_

She hadn't felt a knife sheath on him before. _Not at his waist. Ankle, maybe. Boot knife. Too late to check now._

She wanted to laugh. It felt as though she had been here before, been in this place forever, been in this _position_ forever, and the only thing new was the knife. The last time she'd felt a knife this close, she'd had nothing to fear. It had been the doctor's hand guiding the blade – and while she hadn't doubted he was _capable_ of killing her if circumstances demanded it, she'd had the suspicion that he was, for whatever reason, unwilling.

But the man facing her now… he was more than willing. He was more heavily muscled than she was. Her arms were tiring. And the knife was coming closer.

If ever she had wanted the doctor to walk into a room and offer his assistance, now was the time.


	4. Chapter 4

The doctor was forced to walk past her room.

Fury rose in him that Jack Crawford should be able to enter and speak with her unchallenged, as though he had the right to show such concern when it was undoubtedly some incompetence of his that had put her in such a situation to begin with. He continually sent her into danger without adequate compatriots.

She pulled through each time owing to no merit of his – no, that was owing only to her strength. Her skill. Her will to save the lambs. That it had not yet cost her life was luck alone, for she had shown an alarming disregard for her own life on more than one occasion. She was not foolish, no, but she was _determined_. It was, perhaps, worse.

To Jack Crawford, she was expendable. To Hannibal Lecter, she was indispensable. That the former should be able to speak with her and touch her without need for the latter's stealth or subterfuge was an abomination.

He maintained an outer calm, setting aside the fury, and forced himself to turn his back on the enemy and study a hospital floor plan and bulletin board thoughtfully located on the opposite wall just a few measures down from Clarice's door.

Some small effort filtered and discarded the routine hospital noises from his thoughts, until only the voices from within remained.

"—more coherent than you were yesterday, Starling."

"Don't remember much of yesterday, sir."

Her throat was dry; her voice rasped. _Offer her a drink of water, Jackie-boy._ More than that, though, there was an edge in her voice that might have been fear or pain, he thought. If she followed her statement with a query about what she had said the day before, it would be obvious even to Jack that it was the former rather than the latter.

"S'prolly for the best, though." No, she wouldn't show him her fear. That was private. _To all but me._ "Nurse this morning said she had a note to watch out. Guess the night crew thought I was too feisty."

"Gut wounds are a nasty business, Starling. Don't scrimp on the drugs – the regret'll last longer than the stubborn pride, trust me."

"I'm fine, sir. You'll need me clearheaded to give a statement anyway."

No, she wasn't fine, but it was clear to the doctor, at least, that she would not willingly make herself vulnerable in front of Jack Crawford – particularly not after knowing she had been so yesterday.

_What secrets are you worried you'll spill, Clarice, hmm? What thoughts have you entertained in your altered state of mind?_

"We can hold off on anything official until tomorrow, Starling. It's pretty obvious what happened out there."

_Oh, is it, Jack? Then why have the news accounts been vague on all but the success of the girl's rescue? Why the tight lips? There's more to this shootout of yours than is immediately obvious._

"How's the girl doing, sir?"

"She's fine, Starling. Better than you; they sent her home already. Some bruises, trace amounts of sedative, and her new haircut, but not… well. Not that."

"Good. That's—" A rustle of sheets, a hissing breath. "That's good, sir."

Jack chuckled, a bit awkwardly.

"You asked me that yesterday, too, the second time I stopped in. First time, you were well and truly out of it. Couldn't do anything but ask for a doctor."

The slightest hesitation, and then, "Did I? Good thing I was in a hospital, then."

The doctor's stare burned into the bulletin board. She had needed him. She had been asking for him while he sat in a plane and longed to be at her side. The time had passed; it could not be changed. And unless Clarice allowed it, he could not promise a quicker response in the future.

"Rest up, Starling. And take those meds."

A footfall, followed by another. Jack was preparing to leave, and the doctor could not afford to be found standing in the hallway. He might be mistaken for a media vulture initially, but once Jack Crawford saw his face, despite its subtle changes, the game would be over.

He speedily ran the most satisfying scenario – leaving Jack's cooling corpse lying on the atrocious vinyl tile in the hallway – but it was wishful thinking only. Clarice was recovering from surgery; she was not yet well enough to travel. And she might not wish to depart with him even if she were; certainly not if she must step over Jack's body to do so.

He moved down the hallway toward the stairwell with the steady pace of a man who had places to be but was not in any particular rush to get there.

Jack Crawford's voice followed him. "We'll talk tomorrow before my flight, Starling."

The doctor smiled as the door to the stairs closed behind him.

_But __**we**__ will speak tonight, Clarice. I do hope you'll be feeling chatty._

* * *

><p>Forty-eight hours earlier, on the filthy floor of the kitchen in a rundown farmhouse, the doctor's voice rang clear as a bell in Clarice's mind, as though no other thought dared intrude on his pronouncement.<p>

_Time to stop playing with the cubs, my dear. You're a lioness now. Show your teeth._

She stopped fighting the knife; pushing it away was only prolonging a stalemate in which the enemy had the upper hand. Better to direct it. Her grip on his wrist tightened and yanked, joining her force to his own. The knife pierced her side, a sharp, hot pain all the way through her and into the floor beneath, and she welcomed it because it brought victory, too.

Her tight grip kept him close to her, kept the knife pinned, gave her the push she needed. Her agonized scream was defiant, triumphant, her mouth wide as her abdomen tried to collapse into her back and her torso lunged upward. Her teeth sank into the left side of his neck with violent, bloody force, clamping down hard on the arterial tangle just above the carotid split. He thrashed. She hung on. The knife sawed at her with their combined motion, and she bit down harder against the pain.

She pictured the previous victim laid out on the autopsy table. She pictured the skinned lambs swaying from a beam in the barn. She'd tried to be the sheepdog. She'd tried to guard the flock.

Now… now she was a lioness. A wolf. An alpha female. And her territory was whatever she chose to make it. Today, that included little Maggie Ludhin. And this filthy poaching coyote wasn't going to steal her away.

She forced her jaw to close, forced her teeth to meet inside the meat of the coyote's neck, and tore the slippery bundle loose, growling and ripping until she turned her head and spat a wad of flesh and fat and bloody arterial wall on the floor. Her ears closed to the shrieking mass atop her. She shut her eyes as the hot blood rolled over her face in waves, trickling over her scalp and down her neck and into the collar of the button-down shirt beneath her jacket.

The shrieking became a whistle, and a wheeze, and finally fell silent. The hand under hers on the knife slackened. She shoved, hard, and managed to push the body over her left side, away from the knife.

She wrapped both hands around the handle and yanked straight upward. She couldn't leave it in place; the blade pinned her to the floor, and she still needed to find the girl.

_Don't pass out, Clarice, that's a good girl. You wouldn't want to come so far only to fail now, hmm? What would your daddy say?_

"Bite me, Doctor."

Her eyes fell on the corpse lying beside her, a bite-sized chunk raggedly torn from its throat. Her wit suddenly seemed quite hilarious, amusing beyond measure, and her ensuing laughter sent shockwaves of pain through her bleeding abdomen.

"Bite me," she gasped.

Rolling over, up and onto her knees, required three attempts and a significant amount of panting to accomplish. Her torn and bloodied button-down served as a stopgap measure once she had shed her glass-encrusted jacket. Tied around her stomach just above the arch of her pelvis, her dress shirt did little to staunch the bleeding. The coyote's blood slipping down her neck seemed just as content to soak the T-shirt beneath as it had the dress shirt above.

Clarice pressed her hands to the wall and carefully rose to her feet, aiming for the key ring she had seen before the coyote had jumped her. The door beside it, with its padlock too high for a child to reach, wavered in her vision. And from behind the door came the sound of frightened whimpers.

"Maggie?" Clarice gagged on the taste of blood in her mouth, spat to the side, narrowly missing the corpse, and tried again. "Maggie, honey? It's OK, you're OK."

The key fit the lock. Clarice dropped the open padlock; she had no need for it. She slipped the latch open and pulled. The door was heavy. Metal, she thought, her mind feeling dull and sloppy. What was she thinking? Oh, the door. Steel reinforced, maybe. Not original to the house, that was certain. A recent addition.

She pulled harder, and it swung freely.

Inside, a long pantry with bare shelves above and a nest below, a stinking sleeping bag spread open on the floor with a pale, crying child crouched at its center, ragged brown locks dangling above her shoulders. He'd tried to cut her hair already, then, but hadn't dyed it yet. Perhaps she was still untouched.

"Maggie?"

The door held most of Clarice's weight. She stretched a hand out to the girl, grimacing at the blood covering it. Nothing she could do about it now. God only knew what the rest of her looked like to a small, frightened child.

"Would you like to go home?"

Fearful eyes darted past her.

"He can't hurt you now. I promise."

A tiny hand crept toward hers. Clarice waited.

_Be patient. Let her come to me. _

_As I've been patient, Clarice?_

_I know, Doctor. You have been. And I know what I am now, what I'm capable of. If I make it out of here before I bleed to death, I'll show you._

_When, not if, Clarice. I won't be cheated by death._

Success. Maggie Ludhin clung to her leg and sobbed. Her right leg, where the pain from her piercing radiated downward. _Damn, that hurts. _

She carefully slipped her left hand into the girl's right and maneuvered the child around to her left side. They skirted the body and the blood pool with its void where Clarice's head had lain as she waited for him to die.

As they stepped over the threshold into the dining room, Clarice remembered the broken hutch and the window. Shattered glass lay strewn across the living and dining room both. The girl at her side had bare feet.

There was no way to prepare for the pain; Clarice simply braced her back against the doorframe and bent her left leg. Slivers of glass embedded in her back reminded her of their presence with sharp bursts.

"Up you go, sweetie."

She lifted; the child scrambled up and threw her arms around Clarice's neck. Her dangling left knee brushed Clarice's right side, setting off waves of hot agony. Clarice made a basket of her arms under the girl's thighs and lifted her higher, shifting the added weight to the left as much as she could.

Her right leg dragged as she crossed the dining room, the living room, the porch; lifting brought too much strain to her abdominal muscles. The girl kept her face tucked into Clarice's neck, which was for the best; there was no need for her to see Humphries' body caught up on the broken porch railing. The stairs gave Clarice a jolt on each step. Thank god there were only three and the boards didn't break under her.

She staggered on toward the car, passing Agent Gebb, noting with indifference the bullet wounds in his right leg and upper chest. He wasn't breathing; he hadn't helped with the girl; he was nothing to her now. _You shouldn't have run. She needed you._

Her only goal was the car and its radio. The child needed her parents, and Clarice needed an ambulance.

_And the doctor. When I go to him next time, I won't be leaving again._

The thought pushed her onward.

The passenger door was closer. She tried coaxing the girl to sit down inside, but the thin arms only wrapped more tightly around her neck. Clarice settled for leaning forward, letting the seat hold the girl's weight for her, and reaching past her for the radio. The stretch was agonizing; she struggled to keep her breathing slow and even.

Thank god for field-outfitted SUVs, she thought; the vehicle included a radio with a handset that scanned the dispatch frequencies. Clarice merely flipped a switch to engage the battery backup for use when the engine wasn't running, picked up the handset, and relayed her message, mouth running on autopilot as she requested emergency medical transport for the girl and herself and the coroner's van for the rest.

She laid the mike down when she grew too dizzy to stand. Boosting herself into the SUV's high seat was impossible; she wrenched Maggie's arms from her neck instead and sank to the ground, turning to put her back gingerly against the side of the vehicle, slipping until her head rested on the running board. The girl scrambled down a second later and reclaimed her embrace as best she could in the awkward position.

Clarice raised a hand and stroked the girl's hair, vaguely recalling her father doing the same for her when she had been young and frightened. It seemed longer ago than it was, a distant image, fuzzy, as though a curtain had fallen in her mind. The falling-down farmhouse in front of her looked fuzzy, too. The pain didn't seem so bad now.

If she closed her eyes, she could almost imagine she lay on a picnic blanket in a warm meadow beneath a blue sky dotted with dozens of clouds. She turned her head to the right and saw the doctor lying beside her, hands neatly folded on his chest. Her own hands cradled the back of her head, elbows out. Her knees bounced as her bare feet tapped against the grass.

She smiled. Life was good. Life with the doctor was good. She was going to have her meadows, and her clouds, and her doctor.

His voice broke the silence.

"What do you see, Clarice?"

She studied the clouds.

"Everything," she answered truthfully. "Anything I want."

"And what do you want?"

Her eyes shifted from the sky to him.

"You."

"You're certain, now?"

"I am."

"Then you must wake up, Clarice. _Now._"

She startled to consciousness, her body jerking, her senses registering the crying child in her arms and the mixture of tears and snot adding to the bloody mess on her skin. More importantly, she heard the wail of an ambulance siren.

"C'mon, Maggie. Our ride's here."

She staggered to her feet, the child still wrapped around her left side and squeezing like a python preparing to devour its prey. Clarice edged them slowly along the SUV to the rear bumper and watched the ambulance pull up the drive, a zippy van following in its wake. Its passenger had popped out with a video camera in hand, red light gleaming, almost before the med team had gotten the ambulance doors open.


	5. Chapter 5

Saturday afternoon marked a return to inner calm for Hannibal Lecter – as much as was possible, at any rate. Hearing Clarice's voice, strained though it had been, had quieted the urgent demand that had fueled his spur-of-the-moment travel plans.

He remained eager to see her, of course, but he was suitably assured now that such would not prove impossible. Indeed, it would hardly even be difficult, as it seemed Uncle Jack had seen no need to post a guard on her room, obviously relying upon hospital security to handle any difficulties that might arise with the media. Retaliation was not a concern; if any family members existed, they were unlikely to claim kinship with a child rapist and visit revenge upon his killer.

So it was that Hannibal spent a relatively relaxed afternoon gathering information in passing: the nursing schedule for Clarice's floor; the not-uncommon arrival of consulting doctors from the surrounding area whose patients required more specialized care than rural facilities could provide; and, finally, with the unwitting distraction of a particularly tiresome boor of a man violently attempting to visit his wife – whose injuries he likely had caused himself – a copy of Clarice's medical chart and surgical report.

As late evening, following the initial bed check by the night nursing shift, would provide the longest uninterrupted stretch of time with Clarice, the doctor departed from the hospital in the afternoon with his purloined pages. He perused them with care in his hotel room.

Significant bruising. Small cuts on both hands, shredded skin on the left. Glass shards embedded in the back. Closed, linear fracture at the back of the cranium. Stab wound – perforation, not merely penetration - through the right anterior abdominal wall, exiting out the back. Odd wounds for what the FBI and the media were calling a shootout.

She had not, in fact, been shot at all.

Her chart explained the weeping wound in her side visible in the news footage, but it said nothing of the blood that had coated her face, neck, and hair. None of the listed injuries was indicative of heavy bleeding in that area; he surmised that his initial conclusion had been correct: that blood was not hers. Indeed, an addendum to her record contained a serology report for one Leonard Cook reporting negative results for a bevy of blood-borne pathogens, which suggested contamination concerns. She had escaped that outcome, at the least.

But her actual injuries were not inconsiderable. The cuts and bruises would heal; the glass shards had been removed with only a few stitches required where they had penetrated deeply. The skull fracture, as described, was minor and incomplete. Clarice would remain under observation for the development of closed head injuries – intracranial bleeding chief among them – but the medical team's notes stated that the patient indicated she had not lost consciousness during the attack. Given no complications, the bone would mend itself.

The abdominal wound, however… that had been significant trauma, in some ways worse than a gunshot. A perforating stab wound with the foreign object having been removed long before the patient reached a surgical suite. The description of the injury suggested a long blade, perhaps eight inches. Single-edged. Serrated. A knife more suited to sawing at rope than at the ropy coils of intestines.

He paused in his reading. It was necessary to segregate his emotional response. Clarice was not prey; that she had been so ungracefully… butchered… disgusted him. Had her attacker not been dead already, he would have cheerfully killed the man himself. Demonstrated more appropriate techniques on his flesh, perhaps.

The weapon had entered just under the ribcage through the oblique muscles, angled upward, and proceeded to lacerate the ascending colon and the liver on its way toward the latissimus dorsi. That it had exited rather than continuing upward was a blessing, as such direction avoided damage to the diaphragm and lungs; that it slid further outward, toward the patient's side rather than deeper in, was likewise a blessing, as such direction prevented damage to the kidney that – combined with the liver damage - might have resulted in hypovolemic shock and death before the patient's arrival at a trauma center.

The patient. _Clarice._ His hands well knew the planes of her back and the curves of her ribs, if only through fabric and not yet via the softness of her flesh. Thus it was not difficult to bring to mind the effect of such injuries on her slender frame, to picture the thrust of the knife. The pain would have been excruciating, and she lacked his skill at compartmentalization as yet; she would have felt it keenly. Had she cried out?

The thought disturbed him; he found that her pain was not the enticing prospect it once was. Or perhaps it was simply that her pain, whether physical or emotional, was his alone to savor – she was _his_ insofar as she allowed herself to be. That another should presume to trespass, to witness her in the depths of her pain and vulnerability, was inexcusable.

Room service delivered his dinner as he was mentally reviewing the specifics of Clarice's injuries and the likely course of her recovery. It would be lengthy, he knew, given the muscle and organ damage. He set the thoughts aside to focus on the meal.

A fresh, flavorful Caprese salad to start, followed by seared scallops on a bed of linguini and a rare filet mignon with a side of winter vegetables. He allowed himself two glasses of wine – a dry Riesling and a full-bodied Bordeaux – both acceptable, if not exceptional.

Adequate food, however, was not enough to hold his attention. He brought to mind Clarice's face to keep him company. Knowledge of her true injuries had, it seemed, eliminated his illogical fears, as the image he conjured was no longer bloody and accusing. No, she watched him with soft eyes and a slight smile.

_Admitting weakness, Doctor? You'll be seeing me soon enough, won't you?_

He murmured her name to the empty room and conceded with grace. Were the choice his, he would have her beside him always.

* * *

><p>The day before, as Hannibal Lecter crawled westward, 35,000 miles above the Atlantic, he did not realize that he was also – in the dazed post-operative mind of Clarice Starling – lying on a checkered blanket in an ocean of waving grass. Had he known, the paradox of simultaneously existing in two locations would surely have amused him… though he might, for her sake, have wished a single stride could take him from the former to the latter.<p>

For her part, Clarice was unaware of any existence beyond the blanket in its cozy nest between grass and sky. For a while, at least.

She flinched at the throbbing in her stomach. It had been a dull ache at first, not worth mentioning, but it had steadily gotten worse.

"Are you ill, my dear?" The doctor rolled toward her on their picnic blanket, his upper body now propped on his elbow as he leaned over her slightly.

"Just hurts," she gasped out, fighting the urge to curl into a tight ball. "Dunno what's wrong."

His free hand stroked her face. She couldn't make his out anymore, though it was no more than a foot from her own. The sun seemed so bright it blinded her to all else. And it was hot, hot enough that she was sweating.

"Doctor?"

If he spoke, she could not hear it. The feel of his hand on her face faded. Panic raced through her, and with it came the pain, sharper now. She squeezed her eyes shut, silently begging for a reprieve.

When she opened her eyes, it was to Jack Crawford's worried visage. She turned her head away, trying desperately to bring the world into focus.

"Hey, easy, Starling, easy. It's good to see your eyes open, but you can't be moving around like that."

There was only one man she wanted to see, and Jack Crawford wasn't him.

"Doctor?"

Her voice emerged raspy and uncertain.

"Are you in pain, Starling? I can get the doctor." He reached toward her. "Here, this should help."

She flinched as he grasped her hand with his own and fumbled their fingers around a small plastic tube. "Just press here, Starling. You'll feel better in a minute."

Stop touching me, she wanted to say. _I don't want you touching me. Where's the…_

"Doctor?"

"It's OK, Starling. Clarice. Just relax. You're safe."

He squeezed her hand, thumb pressing down hard on hers, and she couldn't make the muscles obey her command to pull away.

"Doctor?"

Her voice was nearly a sob.

Finally she felt the pressure leaving her hand and the pain in her stomach fading. Her eyes slipped shut.

_I'm here, Clarice. We mustn't let Uncle Jack know, though, hmm?_

She lay on the picnic blanket again, the doctor beside her.

_I won't tell. Just stay with me._

_Always, my dear._


	6. Chapter 6

On Saturday night, late, Hannibal Lecter traveled the dimmed and almost empty halls of the University of Nebraska Medical Center in a borrowed white coat. He would look upon his Starling soon; time and distance would be erased as their lives finally converged once more.

He passed few others in the halls; none questioned his presence. They saw no more than they expected to see. _In a hospital, a white coat covers all sins._

His stride remained even, his pulse steady as he approached her door from the stairwell; using the elevator would have required passing the nurses' station. The knob turned easily under his hand. He quickly stepped inside and closed the door silently behind himself.

Clarice slept in the bed to his left, her face angled slightly toward him on the thin hospital pillow, a soft, diffuse light on above her head. A tremor ran through him at the sight; he held his breath for a moment, the better to hear hers over the hum of the machines monitoring her health.

It was only when he found himself calculating the difficulty of convincing the staff that he was here to transfer the patient to a private facility and obtaining an ambulance for that purpose that he was able to pull his eyes away and resume a normal respiration pattern. An odor drew his attention to the right – neither the antiseptic smell common to all medical facilities nor Clarice's sleeping scent, tinged now by her pain and medications, but still familiar to him from their time together in Germany. No, this was something else, something slightly rank.

A counter with a small wash sink ran along the wall opposite the bed. A handful of flower arrangements filled the space. He walked down the row, noting the cards – one from Ms. Mapp, another from the rescued girl's family – as well as his own offering, the basket untouched but for the stuffed lamb, which was not in evidence. At the end of the row stood a potted chrysanthemum with white flowers.

White mums, their smell irritating his nose, their very presence an offense. A flower suitable for funerals. For graves. His mother had sent such flowers to families in mourning. White mums. Here, in Clarice's room?

He plucked the folded card from its stand.

**You did good, Starling. Rest up. Play this right, and when you're ready, there'll be a place waiting for you in Behavioral Science. – Jack**

"Will there, Jackie-boy?" He kept his voice low, not wishing to disturb Clarice with the rage thickening in his blood. The flowers an insult, the false promises an insult, Jackie-boy's very presence in her sickroom earlier today, at her bedside, an insult.

He slid the card back into place with precision. Hurling the plant into the hall would accomplish nothing but attracting attention, and that he would not do.

Instead, he turned his back to the offensive arrangement and investigated the garment bag slung over a chair to his left and the small duffel bag resting alongside it. Work clothes. Toiletries. Nothing of particular interest, aside from the general interest he took in all things Clarice. Her bags had come from her hotel room, he expected. Had their delivery served as Jackie-boy's excuse for visiting with her today? Had he touched her things?

The doctor knelt and buried his face in the clothes. She had running shorts and sleeveless shirts in addition to the slacks and blouses of her workdays; it was, perhaps, too cold here to run in shorts out of doors, but she might have worked through her case while in the hotel gym, letting the motion of her body relax her mind until it reached the state she needed to make the intuitive leaps he knew her capable of.

Clarice's scent was strong in the workout clothing and the pajamas, less so in the work attire. Another feminine scent reached him – another agent or a worker for the hotel, perhaps – but there was nothing masculine, nothing of the interfering Jack Crawford, on anything but the outer handles of the bags. The knowledge pleased him.

He moved, finally, to Clarice's side. The monitors displayed nothing alarming; she slept peacefully, her vital signs stable, her breathing regular and even. He folded the blanket back to her waist with care and raised the hospital gown so it preserved her modesty but left her abdomen exposed to him. The bruising extended beyond the margins of the sterile covering on her entry wound and surgical site.

Pierced in the side like Christ, he thought, as he carefully unwrapped the dressing to note the bruising and the sutures for himself. _You're young for it yet, Clarice. Biblical scholars would have us believe Christ waited until he reached 33, while you yourself are still working toward 28. Quite the overachieving martyr, aren't you?_

He checked the anterior wound in her abdomen first, and then rolled her slowly to examine the injuries to her back and skull. The dorsal bruising extended significantly further; indeed, he was hard-pressed to find a patch of normal skin tone on her back at all. Her back had connected violently with something – several somethings, most likely – leaving a mottled map of painful reminders behind.

But the stitches closing the larger glass wounds were small and neat, and the cranial swelling suggested the pressure there was being relieved without need for additional medical intervention. Satisfied with the level of her care, he replaced the bandages, gently tugged her gown back into place, and smoothed down the blankets.

Groggy eyes lifted to his. She wasn't quite awake, he saw; no wonder, with the cocktail coursing through her bloodstream. Painkillers, of course, and broad-spectrum antibiotics to ward off peritonitis and other infections that might have attacked the vulnerable organs laid open by an unclean blade.

"Doctor?"

Did she recognize him, or had she merely assumed anyone bending over her hospital bed would be a doctor of some sort? He privately admitted he hoped for the former, given the pleased lilt in her voice.

"Good evening, Clarice."

She smiled, faintly.

"I killed the coyote."

Coyote? Perhaps her mental faculties were even less present than he'd thought.

"Did you now?"

The slightest bob of her head in agreement.

"'Cause I'm a lioness. You said so."

His eyes flashed in the dim light of her room.

"Hmm. If I said it, it must be so."

"Uncle Jack won't like it."

He narrowly avoided raising his eyebrows to his hairline. Clarice had never commented upon his overly familiar, derogatory nickname for Jack Crawford – but she had never used it herself, either, never referred to him aloud as less than Mr. Crawford in the doctor's presence.

"Too messy," she continued, head bobbing once more. "Can't show him my teeth."

"Oh?" If he'd ever had a stranger conversation with Clarice Starling, he could not now recall it.

"He'll be _afraid_," she whispered, in the way that children do when they mean to share a secret with a single person and instead announce it to the entire room. "Not like you. Nobody's like you, Doctor. 'Cept me."

He had not lost her; she would mend. His heart was full.

_This time. But what of the next?_

His buoyancy deflated. So long as she remained in the service of the FBI, he must daily accept the possibility of losing her. Dragged away in the snow, bound by Jack Crawford's tether.

He recaptured her wandering attention with a caress of her name.

"Clarice."

Her eyes drifted back to his.

"I should very much like to embrace you for a moment. If you'll permit me?"

It was a ridiculous impulse, this need to touch her, almost as ridiculous as his need to see her in person had been. Would he always find himself needing more, never satisfied, when it came to Clarice Starling? His need for her was something beyond what reason could encompass.

He had read her chart and checked her injuries; he had watched her sleep; he had listened to her voice. Touch, beyond the medical, was an unnecessary luxury. Yet he could not – would not – resist the urge, unless she denied him.

She was silent, watching. Perhaps she had forgotten the question. Perhaps she was so medicated that true conversation was an impossibility. Perhaps –

"_I_ should very much like to embrace _you_ for a very long while, Doctor." Were her eyes clearer now? Her words had been overly precise, like a drunk desperate to avoid slurring in front of the law. She seemed quite pleased with herself, if her wide, somewhat drug-addled smile and arch tone could be trusted. "The rest of my life, I think. If _you'll_ permit _me_?"

He lowered his upper body to the bed, his heart full once more, and carefully – oh so carefully, mindful of the tubes and wires, the bandages and bruises – enfolded her within his arms. His hand skated across something soft that was not her and not hospital sheets. Ah. A lump beneath the pillow beside her head proved to have suspiciously stuffed-lamb-like legs poking out. He smiled at her clear acceptance of his gift.

Her face burrowed into his neck, the flexible plastic canula beneath her nose brushing his skin as she inhaled.

"Mmm. You smell just like I remembered."

He was pleased, then, to have taken the time to pack a bag of personal items, including his aftershave.

"Much nicer than the coyote," she continued.

The coyote again. Something significant to her, no doubt. Aloud, he said only, "Close enough to smell him, were you? And what do coyotes smell like, Clarice?"

He felt the wrinkling of her nose.

"This close. Fear. Lust. Filth. Had to kill him to save her."

The connection became vividly clear in an instant, but the news reports had indicated the pedophile – Clarice's coyote – had been killed in a shootout with FBI agents. How, then, had she been so close? Learning the answer would certainly clear up the mystery of how she had ended up stabbed rather than shot in the confrontation – and the mystery of the blood covering her in the now-famous news footage.

"You shot him from this close, Clarice?"

Her head moved; a negative response, he judged.

"Don't you 'member? You told me how, Doctor." Her nose wrinkled again. "He tasted awful."

"Of course, Clarice. Please forgive me." She had _tasted_ the man? "Tell me again how you emerged victorious?"

"Grabbed the knife." Her fingers moved feebly.

"Helped him." From the downward motion of her arm and the wound in her side, he quite took her meaning.

"Kept it pinned in me."

Her mouth opened wider; her teeth scraped at his neck, a brush he would categorize as sensual in other circumstances.

"Bit. Tore. Spat. Bleeding stinking coyote blood. Quiet now. Shhh. Have to listen for Maggie."

Maggie was the girl, he recalled, his mind busy processing her explanation.

_Tore his throat out? My Clarice._

A fierce pride took him; he was careful to mind his grip rather than clutching her more tightly as he wished to do.

_No – her own, and no other's. _

But what a lovely matched set they made.

"Well done, Clarice," he murmured. That, then, was the reason the official story had claimed the event had merely been a gunfight. The blood that had coated her in the video footage had been arterial spray washing over her. The FBI no doubt held the true story close so it might better perpetuate its myth of two dead heroes and one live one without dirty little details getting in the way. It was no surprise the Bureau's image was its members' primary concern, less than six months after their public relations nightmare in Texas.

He found himself humbled by her courage and her willingness to see events through to the end, certain now that the potential he had sensed in her years ago as she sat outside his cell in Baltimore had finally ripened. She needed neither the badge nor the gun, though he suspected the sense of duty to the lambs would never leave her.

"And now, my dear?" He felt a tremble of fatigue roll through her and carefully, methodically, disentangled himself from their embrace. "What are your plans now?"

She frowned – in uncertainty, not anger, he thought.

"Dunno. Didn't think you'd come here. Too risky. Figured I'd have to go find you."

Ah. Was that what elation felt like? More than the mere satisfaction of a plan well executed.

"A foolish but necessary action, my dear." He brushed her hair gently from her face, smoothing it against her pillow. "I'm afraid you are quite irresistible."

"You too, Doctor." She tilted her head into his hand, stopping his motion even as she increased their contact.

"And what of the FBI?" A necessary question, though he loathed the chance that she might take refuge there once more.

"Psych discharge, I s'pose. Give 'em what they expect – tears an' trauma." Her face turned sour. "Jack'll like that. S'what he's always wanted to see from me, I think. Might be suspicious at first, but he can't resist the show when he wants it so bad."

My, my. She _had_ expanded her thinking, hadn't she? The doctor hummed in agreement.

"He wants a weak, mewling thing, Clarice. Not a warrior. Not the brave, beautiful creature you are."

"Too bad for him, then." She winced, and her hand fumbled for something atop the blanket. Ah. The morphine pump, he noted, as her hand closed around it. Her thumb did not press down. "Better… better tell me the plan before… I drift off, Doctor. M'not dreaming again, am I?"

"You're not dreaming, Clarice. But you will be shortly." His fingers stroked lightly against hers; she held the pump in a tight clench that communicated her pain. He would not make the decision for her. She was not a child, and he would not treat her as such. "Sleep. I'll be nearby if you have need of me, hmm? We mustn't prolong your recovery with ill-considered action now. There'll be time enough for plans later."

He waited as she considered his words. His fingers continued stroking hers in a soothing rhythm. Her thumb finally depressed the button, sending a flood of pain relief into her bloodstream. He watched the change come over her face, his fingers clasping hers as she allowed the pump to fall to the sheets. She had trusted his judgment, trusted his promise that there would be a later. She allowed herself to be vulnerable in front of him as she had not with Jack Crawford.

He lifted her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss over her knuckles. Her eyes slipped shut. When her breathing eased into the slow rhythm of sleep, he silently took his leave.


	7. Chapter 7

Clarice Starling sat beside her daddy, eyes closed, body warm where his strong arm curled around her back. The porch swing creaked as it swayed under them.

"You're sleeping the day away, pumpkin."

Daddy's voice. That wasn't right, though. It should be night. It was always night here.

She opened her eyes and immediately realized three things: the sun was shining; she was not a child; her father was not covered in blood.

"I never was, pumpkin, not like you imagine it. Your nightmares are strong stuff, Clarice, like the shot of whiskey in the bottom of the beer."

She pulled back and looked at him – truly looked – and found he was healthy and whole, as she had seen him before that night.

"You're not really here, are you, Daddy?"

"The only one here is you, pumpkin, but I s'pose you already know that. You were a clever child. Curious. A real go-getter. Made me proud."

"But I'm not a child now. And you won't be – aren't – here to be proud of me."

"S'that why you think I'm not, pumpkin? I haven't seen the woman you've grown into, so I can't know about what you've done with your life? You can't know how I woulda felt about it, so you reckon I'd be disappointed in you."

"Yes." It hurt, still, to acknowledge that loss. She would never earn his approval; how could she, when she didn't know what he would say?

"Bullshit."

"What?"

"You heard me, Clarice." His voice was firm, the voice that told her to finish her homework before she went out to play, the voice that insisted she apologize to Jamie McVey for punching him in the face after he called her a dumb girl.

"You know the kind of man I was, even if you think you can't remember. You know I approved of you when you'd done right. What makes you think I'd be any different now, when you're a woman grown? By the time I died, you'd already learned the lessons you needed to know. Be polite and respectful, honest and fair, help those as can't help themselves – you've done that, pumpkin. Why in blue blazes would you think I'd be disappointed in you for that?"

"Because I… there's more to me than that, Daddy. There's anger and violence, and sometimes I just want to… to let it take control of me. And there's…" _a man. _

Really? Was she going to try explaining Hannibal Lecter to her father? The doctor defied explanation. Which, she supposed, made her father's next words inevitable.

"So are you gonna introduce me to your young man, Clarice?" He lifted his chin and nodded toward the yard.

She followed the motion and saw what she had not before – the doctor, seated on a picnic blanket, watching them. The hill rose at his back, and she realized with a start that he had positioned himself between her and the killing floor. She could not hear the lambs screaming over the rise; she felt no urgency drawing her to the butchers and their knives. _He didn't position himself, Clarice. You put him there. This is your mind, after all. _

"He's been awfully patient, pumpkin, don't you think?"

"I do, or you wouldn't be saying it," she murmured, rising to her feet. She crossed the grass between them with her father at her side; the doctor stood as they approached.

"Daddy, this is Dr. Hannibal Lecter, my…." No, there wasn't a word for what he was to her. She shrugged. "Mine."

She caught the doctor's smile and thought her possessiveness pleased him in some way. Or it pleased her to think it pleased him, she supposed, given that he only acted here as she expected him to act.

"Doctor… _Hannibal_… this is my father."

The men shook hands, exchanging pleasantries, and the doctor invited them to sit. An awkward silence descended, broken by two men speaking in a single voice.

"Clarice thinks very highly of you."

Her father continued. "But I need to know that you'll take care of my little girl. Protect her. Provide for her."

She could only watch, appalled, as her childish notions of her father's old-fashioned paternalism hijacked her dream.

The doctor's response was calm, measured.

"Clarice would dispute the necessity for such action, I expect. She is quite capable of protecting herself, current injuries aside, and I have no desire to place limitations on her expression of her needs and desires. I may protect her only insofar as she allows it. She is no longer a child."

"She's a hell of a lot younger than you."

"Yes. Admittedly, I was initially concerned that her interest in me was simply another manifestation of her search for a father figure. It's an impulse she is unlikely to lose, the desire to choose partners who remind her of her father in some ways, to regain what she has lost; I'm certain, through her formal studies in psychology, she is well aware of it."

"And who's she replacing in your life, then?"

Clarice turned to the doctor to watch his reaction, quite eager to hear his reply. He smiled softly at her.

"She doesn't think she knows the answer to that yet. Do you, Clarice?"

She shook her head, slowly. No… he had mentioned a father, and a mother… and… _while she carried my sister in her womb_. Oh! A younger sister. Was that….

"You see, Clarice? You have the answer after all."

Her daddy spoke up, an angry bite in his voice. "So you're her father and she's your sister? You don't think that's just a bit sick?"

"No more so than the sordid entanglements of all human relationships." And still the doctor did not rage. Why not, she wondered. Because… _because this is my mind, and I'm not angry at the accusation. Because I know it doesn't have any merit._

"I am not her father; she is not my sister. If we fulfill the emotional needs left unmet in each other from the loss of those ties, we do so with open minds and clear eyes. That we would seek to do so as lovers says nothing more than that we might wish to be all things to each other."

Yes. That was right. Clarice stretched out a hand and interlaced her fingers with her father's.

"I feel whole when I'm with him, Daddy." She smiled with something that wasn't quite regret but wasn't quite happiness, either. "I don't… I don't have to explain myself to you. I hope you would understand, but… but it doesn't matter if you would or not. I understand, and the doctor – Hannibal – understands, and that's enough for me."

She leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to his cheek.

"I love you, Daddy, but it's time for you to go."

She closed her eyes, heard murmured reassurances in her ear, felt the ruffle of fingers in her hair… and then there was nothing. Her eyes opened to the sun on the doctor's face and his outstretched arm ready to reel her in to his side.

"Didn't we agree you should be sleeping, my dear?"

She nodded, already drifting off with her ear pressed to his chest.

"We did. I am. It's a good dream, I think. You'll listen for the lambs, just in case?"

"Of course, Clarice."

She slept on.

* * *

><p>Unconditional trust, in Hannibal Lecter's estimation, was a foolish bit of nonsense that left one vulnerable to attack.<p>

And despite his deep love for Clarice Starling, he knew her too well to believe that the tide of emotion within her could not turn again. Thus was his delight in her determined allegiance to him muted by a wary caution, tempered with the knowledge that such a traumatic event and the lowered inhibitions brought about by pain medication were not the ideal circumstances for her emotional shift.

If she had not been moving in his direction already, she might simply—

_What, come to my senses and leave you?_

_You did it in June, my dear._

Her voice was silent. She would, in reality, have argued the point, he expected. But in his mind – though he well knew the reasons for it – she had run away. She had been unwilling to confront the obstacles between them. His declaration of love had not been enough to sway her.

He did not blame her for that; she had been honest with him, as frankly charming as ever, to the extent of her own self-knowledge. But she could not tell him what she did not know – and she clearly did not then know if she could accept his love with her whole heart and mind.

He knew, as she did now, it seemed, that her heart was his. But the intricate depths of her mind – they might yet elude him, might yet twist away in the weeks and months of her recovery and leave him alone once more.

That was not acceptable.

And he would have no better chance than now to cement her decision. He would have to make certain that her attention – her thoughts – remained positively focused on himself and the future they might build together. The truths of her subconscious must be made fully conscious, must be made to stick fast in the depths of her mind as they did in the depths of her heart. And that knowledge must rise to the surface and remain there, as well.

It had been clear to him for more than a year now, since the night of his escape, that her desire equaled his own. Her innocently voiced request – that he return to the bed, to _their_ bed, as though it were not merely desired but _expected_, a normal state of affairs – yes, savoring that moment of unlooked-for honesty had sustained him through months of separation.

He had brought those feelings to the surface for her in June, pushing her to realizations that had shaken her footing. Made her question her own understanding of herself. But she had taken the final steps now herself, without his interference. He need only keep her on the path she had chosen – make it a pleasure to walk further into his arms, away from the restrictions of outside authority, of Jack Crawford and the FBI.

It would not be immediate, but it would be _soon._


	8. Chapter 8

From the moment Jack Crawford walked through the door of her hospital room Sunday afternoon, Clarice's overriding thought was simply this: The meeting could not be over fast enough to suit her.

When Jack was here, the doctor was not – and given the choice, she knew which one she would choose.

_You would've chosen the other way last year. Hell, you __**did **__choose the other way just a few months ago. _

_I didn't understand myself then. No – I wouldn't __**accept**__ myself then. I do now._

Crawford was perusing the floral tributes on the counter across from her. He paused at the basket of baby clothes.

"That's an odd choice." His hand dug through the items without asking. Clarice suppressed her irritation at the presumption. "No card, either."

"Mistaken delivery, probably. I'm sure the nurses can find someone in the maternity ward who needs that stuff."

_I already have what I need._

She shifted slightly, feeling the lump of the stuffed lamb under the pillow beside her head. It was a reminder that he was thinking of her – even when she had thought him on another continent entirely.

"But you're not here to critique the gifts from my adoring public, are you, sir?"

He laughed, though she'd been only half-joking. The nurses had shown her the coverage in the papers. The FBI had been soaking up the good press from Maggie Ludhin's rescue, a welcome change from the months of recrimination and finger-pointing in the wake of the Waco fiasco. _Great for them. Not so great for me, if I don't want my face plastered on every paper and TV newscast across the country. Makes it hard to disappear._

"I've been giving the media the no comment routine so far on your behalf, Starling, but it might be good for you to give some interviews, erase some of the Lecter stigma."

She carefully swallowed back her anger. It was only natural for Jack Crawford to think that she resented the so-called _stigma_ of her association with Hannibal Lecter. And god knew she didn't want to disabuse him of that notion.

"It's been more than a year since my visits to the asylum, sir. I hardly think any respectable media outlets care at this point."

Respectable being the key word, she thought. The Tattler still hadn't abandoned its smear campaign. When other scandals were thin on the ground, they dropped in some new "exclusive" development in the hunt for Hannibal Lecter. Nothing true, of course, but that hardly mattered to the tabloid. Last month had been the worst of it – a one-year retrospective rehashing the escape and her own interactions with him in the months leading up to it. She was betting their "anonymous" source had been Frederick Chilton, self-importantly touting knowledge he didn't have and wouldn't understand if he did.

"Uh-huh. I saw the Tattler's anniversary piece last month, too, Starling. Trotting out all that romance bullshit… well. It's why I thought this case would be a good opportunity for you." Crawford eyed her with a frown on his face, wincing a bit as he no doubt imagined the wounds he could not see. "It didn't turn out quite how I expected, but a couple of carefully orchestrated interviews with the TV media would go a long way toward improving the FBI's image in a post-Waco world – and that'll draw some bigger backers to your corner."

At least he wasn't hiding his reasoning. It was all politics. She sighed, recognizing once again how wrong she had been to put her faith in the justice dealt out by the FBI – by the gatekeepers of authority at all. _My judgment is the only one that matters. _

"Sir… that's not why I did it. A little girl was in danger. I did my job. That's all."

"Like it or not, Starling, you're a hero cop now." Crawford sat down in the chair at her bedside and leaned forward, his forearms resting on his thighs. "You can use that to help you go places in the Bureau."

"The only place I've ever wanted to go in the Bureau is Behavioral Science, sir. I think you know that." _And the only place I want to go now isn't even in the same ZIP code._

"And a wider network of favorable opinions will help you do that, Starling. Just play nice with a few reporters, answer some softball questions about how it feels to be that kid's savior—"

"And say _what_, sir? That I ripped a man's throat out to stop him from raping and murdering a little girl? That I was _lucky_? That Humphries didn't deserve a spot in Behavioral Science and couldn't lead a team to save his life? That Gebb should've stayed in the damned car for all the help he was? Because _that's_ the truth of it."

She'd shocked him with her bluntness, it seemed. He couldn't meet her eyes. Maybe her anger confused him; after all, he had never understood her passion for justice. He seemed to think it was some sort of quest for fame, to make a name for herself in Behavioral Science.

But it had never been about making a name for herself; it had only ever been about saving the lambs - finding the most effective place for her to use her skills to do so. To serve truth. The only approval she had needed was her father's… and she understood, now, that such was beyond her. It was irrelevant, unnecessary, and Jack Crawford was not an acceptable substitute.

"We're, uh, we're just calling it a shootout in the media, Starling."

Yes, she had seen, thanks to the nurses. But surely that was just officials speaking in generalities. He couldn't expect her to smile for the cameras and pretend that the whole thing had been some squeaky clean affair, a standoff at ten paces with dueling pistols or a sheriff taking out a gunslinger at high noon on a dusty street.

"You want _me_ to say it was a shootout? I barely grazed him. He didn't even shoot me."

"Right, right, but…." He shifted in the chair, the worn vinyl squeaking as he moved. "Look, Starling, the local LEOs arrived and secured the scene while the media vultures were busy filming you and the kid getting in the ambulance. The… wound… in the suspect's neck could have been from something else. Your gun, a weapon of opportunity grabbed from the floor, whatever."

"My gun was in the dining room, empty, at that point, sir. And any competent medical examiner will be able to recognize teeth marks in flesh."

"We can take care of it, Starling. You just need to watch what you say."

His persistence irritated her, and her body responded to that irritation with more tension and alertness. Awareness of danger. None of which helped the residual pain in her body, pain she refused to alleviate with more medication until he had gone.

"So you want me to go on the record and lie."

He sighed, heavily, closing his eyes.

"Just give it some thought, Starling. I'll handle the media. You won't have to speak with them." Crawford opened his eyes and stood, his hand tapping the back of the chair twice before he spoke again.

"You want a post in Behavioral Science? You need to show the section chiefs you can play ball. Ambition, dedication, honesty, a passion for justice… they won't get you what you want, Starling. Trust me on this – I've been playing this game for as long as you've been alive. They're admirable traits, but they'll never get you what you want."

She watched him walk out of the room, stunned into silence. In his rapid-fire delivery of harsh truths, Jack Crawford had never sounded more like Hannibal Lecter – and she could never tell him that. _You'd appreciate the irony, though, wouldn't you, Doctor?_

* * *

><p>On Sunday afternoon, Hannibal Lecter developed a deeper sense of appreciation for his unwavering self-control.<p>

In matters other than Clarice, he chided himself. _One mustn't lie about that._

Following Jack Crawford was an invigorating bit of fun and a constant temptation. The man was so utterly oblivious to his trespasses against Clarice – and so utterly unaware of the doctor's own presence – that it would have been a simple matter to snatch him and return him to the FBI piece by piece.

It was a pity that such action would draw unwelcome attention. Thoughts, however, carried no such penalties – and so it was that Lecter passed much of Sunday afternoon inventing amusing ways in which Uncle Jack might meet his demise while acting upon none of them.

As Jackie-boy had mentioned his plans to fly out today after speaking with Clarice, it was no trouble for the doctor to wait in the parking garage where he might observe the same rental car he had witnessed Crawford depart in the day before. Of course, waiting in the garage meant he was also excruciatingly aware that every moment that passed was one in which Jack Crawford shared Clarice's company while he did not.

The garage was relatively isolated, its sightlines broken up by pillars and curves and the American penchant for driving oversized pickup trucks. A pillar conveniently located merely two spaces away from Jackie-boy's rented Ford Taurus would have provided sufficient cover had he desired to make contact.

And from that barest of beginnings, threads of thought spun out on the loom of Hannibal Lecter's mind.

A swift and silent slash, blood spurting from the carotid in lovely arcs as Jack dropped to his knees, hands uselessly reaching for the broken dam that could not be plugged.

No. Unsatisfying. Too quick. Jackie-boy deserved to see his death coming for him. And Hannibal Lecter deserved to _see _him seeing it.

Again, then.

Stepping out from behind the pillar as the investigator passed. Extending an arm in a pleasant greeting, clasping too firmly as Jackie-boy instinctively returned the automatic handshake response.

"Hello, Jack." Awareness, perhaps fear, in his eyes as he recognized the doctor's voice. "Tell me, do you see Will much these days?"

The Harpy, a sharp, deep thrust below the midline. Pulling upward, watching the blood spill from Jack's lips as the lungs flooded with fluid and the entrails pushed forward into the gap.

"Not to worry. Clarice and I will look in on him for you."

No. Too messy. Belly to belly as he disemboweled his prey would make it difficult to collect Clarice afterward, and he had no suitable change of clothing prepared in the BMW.

Very well. Again, then.

Parking in the open space on the far side of the pillar, as it would make things easier to transport the guest of honor.

Waiting for the right moment to wrap his arm around the other man's neck in a sleeper hold, wiry strength and the concrete bulk of the pillar pinning him in place until he succumbed. With the proper amount of pressure on the carotid, it would take a mere two seconds to engage the appropriate chemical response in the body and induce brief unconsciousness.

Open the trunk and heave him inside, quickly, before anyone else stepped into view. No need to be delicate; the patient wouldn't have terribly much time to bruise. Restraints? No, he had none in the car and the rental company had not supplied anything appropriate, unless he cut the back seatbelts. But they would be difficult to tie.

Drugs, then, the prepared hypodermic with its sedative cocktail currently stowed in the inner pocket of his coat. For emergencies only - though, of course, if one were properly prepared, no such event could truly rise to the level of emergency.

A short drive to an isolated location. The area had many from which to choose. The bluffs near the river, perhaps. _Would you enjoy that, Jack? A nice float down the river, like those girls whose deaths first brought Clarice to me?_

Yes, that would suit. The evening would be dark and cold and the location unlikely to bring unwelcome visitors. They might chat for hours, he and Jack, in the tall grasses along the winding Missouri River. He would thank the man for sending Clarice to him, and await an apology for Jack's clumsy attempts to lead her on and steal her back with promises he would never fulfill. And then he would open Jack up to see the truth of his life with a few choice cuts - a verbal flaying - before he ended that life.

But should he bring Clarice a gift? Proof that he had rid her of the nagging irritant of a man who pursued her without understanding her? Who sought to suffocate her in a cocoon of falsity?

Ah. No, perhaps not. She might not appreciate it yet.

But someday… someday, they might stalk game together. Might his lioness yet reach that point?

_Coyotes._ His lips twitched. _Yes, she might at that._

That would be pleasant, would it not? Hmm. Again, then.

Waiting. Waiting for Clarice to heal. Waiting for Jack to be vulnerable. A chance meeting, from the prey's perspective.

"Jack!" Clarice, seemingly startled, pleasantly surprised. "I didn't expect to run into you here. How's work?"

"Clarice Starling? What's it been, a year, year and a half? I thought you were off seeing the world." Jackie-boy would hardly resist the urge to come closer, to see his former protégé, so vibrant now without the weight of the FBI pulling her down.

"I am. With a friend." Her smile, her cunning little smile, the fun flash in her eyes. She did so love games, his Clarice. "You might remember him."

"Hello, Jackie-boy."

Turning, wary, the scent of fear rising – yes, the doctor would look into Jack Crawford's eyes and see his fear, see the disturbed realization grow in his eyes.

"A friend? I don't understand-"

Two small steps forward, and his hand would rest on Jack's chest, enjoying the moments of panic as the man's heart raced beneath his palm in the terrified rhythm of the hare when the mountain lion's paw crushes its ribcage. But he would not be the hunter here; no, he would be the distraction, holding the prey with his gaze.

Jack would choke, then, and the doctor would know Clarice had taken the opening provided to sever the renal arteries with her own Harpy. No glass case now. The lioness has sharp claws of her own; one mustn't offer one's unprotected back if one cannot be certain of the outcome.

"No," she would tell her fallen mentor as her eyes met the doctor's, the prey trapped between their bodies. "You don't understand. And you never will, Jack. But you helped _me_ understand... and for that, I'm making this quick. The shock and blood loss will dim the lights for you soon enough. And we won't take anything from you, Jack, I promise you that. There's nothing of you that I want inside me."

A pleasant tableau, indeed. But the doctor set the thought aside. That day was far from this one, he expected. And today, his only tasks were to ensure that Jack Crawford would in fact depart - and perhaps to do a bit of wardrobe shopping.

* * *

><p>Afternoon and evening brought no more visitors to Clarice's door beyond the routine nursing checks. Not that she had expected the doctor would arrive before dark; still, the hours moved like glaciers, in tiny increments, and she slumbered for a time only to wake to the crack heralding the breaking off of another fifteen-minute chunk. It seemed never-ending, and she didn't even have dinner to disrupt the monotony; she was still receiving nutrition in liquid form.<p>

Her overnight nurse, Susan, stopped in just after eight o'clock and checked the IV placement, taping it more securely where the edges had peeled up from Clarice's arm rubbing against the blanket. Clarice obligingly held still, watching the woman work. The level on the morphine pump was noted next; the nurse wrote something down on the clipboard she'd laid atop the nightstand.

"I won't bother refilling it this time, honey. There's enough to get you through the night with the tapered dosing, and they'll want to look at switching you to oral painkillers in the morning."

"Can we get rid of that, too?" Clarice motioned toward the catheter bag hanging on the side of the bed.

The nurse smiled. "Everyone's always eager to ditch that, honey. They'll see in the morning; it depends on how you tolerate sitting and standing. Can't risk you falling on your way to the bathroom and rupturing your stitches."

Clarice looked at the door on the opposite side of the room. It was maybe ten feet away. The nurse followed her gaze before turning back, nodding.

"Yes, even in that little distance. You're gonna find, in the next few weeks, that you use abdominal muscles for things you don't even think about. And right now, your abdominal muscles aren't going to want to do any of those things. You'll need to let them mend a bit before you start strengthening them again."

"So no running marathons, is what you're saying." She dredged up a half-hearted smile; it was hardly the nurse's fault that enforced bed rest wasn't on her list of fun activities.

"And no standing too long in the shower, and no driving a car, and no bending over to touch your toes, is what I'm saying. But your doctor will have a chat with you about all of those things tomorrow; there's no need to fuss about them now. You're on track to be discharged Tuesday morning, so long as you can manage to follow instructions."

The suggested restrictions began to remind Clarice uncomfortably of the last time she'd been hospitalized, after the clusterfuck on the DEA raid, when she'd spent weeks with a boot on her broken foot and a sling around her wounded arm, letting Ardelia drive her to work and to doctor's appointments and generally hating every moment of feeling like a helpless burden. Could this be even worse than that?

Something of her distress must have shown on her face - or maybe she'd been silent too long - because Nurse Susan laid a gentle hand on her arm.

"It's a lot to take in. Try not to worry yourself over it. A nice long sleep will do wonders, and any questions you have will be answered in the morning. Just let the morphine pull you under and give your body time to heal in peace, alright?"

Clarice nodded. "Sure. Peaceful sleep. No problem."

"Just use the call button if you need something, honey. I'll be back to check in on you later."

The door closed behind her, and Clarice was once more left with her thoughts and her endless waiting. She had no idea what time he'd arrived the night before. It might be hours yet. But it might be minutes. Or she might have imagined the whole thing. Because really, wasn't it entirely far-fetched that Hannibal Lecter, a man of cold and calculating reason and towering intellect, had crossed an ocean and risked his freedom merely to assure himself of her well-being?

He was also a man of deep emotions, she reminded herself. _And he loves me. It's not just a casual word to him. It has weight and meaning._

She checked the wall clock. The glaciers still moved in fifteen-minute chunks. She wished they would hurry.

_He was here. It wasn't a dream. And he'll come back._

_But… if he doesn't?_

Was she some swooning Victorian lady or Southern belle to wait on him? To sob and passively accept his abandonment? _Hell no._

_Then I'll find his ass and tell him that he can't just waltz in and out of my life like that._

_Like you've done to him, you mean?_

…_yeah. Like that. Shit._

She rolled her head on the pillow until her cheek lay over the lumpy limbs of the lamb shoved underneath. He hadn't sent a card, but who else would have known to send a lamb?

She watched the door, hoping to hear the soft click that might herald his arrival. But she slid into sleep without hearing it, and though she woke several times throughout the night, not once did she find him at her bedside. Her mood grew darker with each disappointment.

When she woke the seventh time, it was to the cheerful efficiency of Nurse Marjorie, her daytime minder, with another round of medical checks. The removal of the various tubes tethering Clarice to the bed after her chat with the doctor overseeing her case was the highlight of her morning.

She made a slow, careful trip to the bathroom on her own two feet - with assistance there and back - and was able to wash her face and brush her teeth, at least, but the exertion left her exhausted. Less than two hours after she'd woken up, she slipped back into sleep.


	9. Chapter 9

Hannibal Lecter presented himself at the nurses' station on Clarice's floor promptly at ten o'clock Monday morning. Jack's departure had opened a new avenue of opportunity that he might exploit; he had not visited during the night so as not to jeopardize it. If Clarice, helped along by opiate intervention, had slept as deeply as she had the night before, she would likely not have noted his absence.

She would have had her morning exam and her breakfast by now, he expected; it was an opportune time to visit, and he might spend the full day if all went well and she did not object.

The woman seated at the desk held up a finger as she finished reassuring someone on the other end of the phone line that their loved one had passed a restful night. The wait was merely a few moments.

"Can I help you?"

"Yes, I'm here to sit with Clarice Starling?" His voice struck a note between questioning and commanding, that of a person in a new situation but one who expected to get his way nonetheless. "I'm Agent Thomas. Jack will have left a note, I'm sure."

"You're FBI?" She stood up and studied him across the counter. He had worn a suit today; he'd kept his own slacks and shirt for comfort, but a newly purchased, slightly ill-fitting, rumpled jacket completed the ensemble. Nothing more expensive than a government servant might afford. His gabardine coat hung over his left arm.

"I've worked with Clarice before; I believe Jack felt a familiar face would be helpful in keeping her occupied." He smiled, as though sharing a confidence. "We wouldn't want her taking out her frustrations on the nursing staff."

The nurse - Marjorie, by her name tag - laughed. "She's been an angel compared to some of the patients we get. But she's rarin' to go, that's for sure. Tomorrow, probably, if she tolerates the switch to oral painkillers well today."

Her fingers flipped through a file pulled from the rack. He used the time to set part of his mind on a track preparing for Clarice's anticipated discharge from the hospital. It would be best to have matters well in hand, leaving her less room to argue and sabotage her own recovery.

"Well, I don't have a note here." Nurse Marjorie frowned as she returned the file to its place. "Technically, I think the media rules are still in force."

"Ah." He mirrored her frown with one of his own. "Well, Jack no doubt had plenty on his mind. He had to be back in D.C. today. I'd hate to trouble him with something so minor, but I know he wouldn't have wanted Clarice to be alone all day. The local office, of course, is busy with young Agent Gebb's funeral. Such a tragedy."

The nurse's brow furrowed; her head tipped to the left.

"Maybe someone here could vouch for you? Someone else at the desk, maybe?"

He shook his head, pretending to think.

"No… I don't suppose… well…." He looked down, imitating embarrassment. "I did send Clarice a basket from the gift shop Saturday. The lovely woman behind the counter might remember me. Adeline, I believe it was."

Marjorie smiled and picked up the phone.

"Oh, sure, everybody meets Addie. Hang on a minute."

She dialed an extension, greeted the voice at the other end, and proceeded to explain the situation. The doctor waited patiently, a pleasant, interested smile on his face.

Nurse Marjorie pulled the phone away from her mouth for a moment.

"Sir, what did you send Agent Starling?"

He described the basket with a somewhat sheepish demeanor; Marjorie raised her eyebrows and grinned as she repeated the information into the phone.

"Yeah? Describe him to me, Addie." She studied the doctor with a critical eye, peering at his face. Then she laughed. "Uh-huh. Yeah, that's about the size of it, I'd wager, too. Thanks, Addie."

She hung up the phone and rearranged her face into a reasonable approximation of sternness.

"Addie says no marriage proposals in hospital rooms. Too much excitement for the patient."

The doctor shook his head, friendly smile intact, and raised his fingers in the traditional American Boy Scout salute. People could be so very helpful when they saw what they wished to see, he thought. Given a lovestruck co-worker, the love immediately became much more interesting than the credentials.

"No, not today, on my honor."

"Good. G'wan, then." She waved him down the hall. "Room 254. There's books on the cart here if you want something to read. She'll probably sleep a lot of the time."

"Yes, thank you, that's quite thoughtful of you." He took a few moments to make his selection, concealing his disdain for the choices. Tucking a book under his arm, he strode down the hall to Clarice's room. _No need for me to hide today, Jackie-boy. Soon, you'll have lost her entirely – and your loss will be my gain._

He entered the room to find Clarice asleep. After quietly arranging the guest chair at her bedside, to her left, where he might also watch the door, he seated himself and opened the book. He scanned the first page. It was, in a word, terrible.

Nevertheless, he cleared his throat and began to read aloud in a smooth, low tone, occasionally interjecting his own comments.

It wasn't long before Clarice's eyes fluttered open and sought him out. Her eyes grew wide, first, and then flicked to the window where sunlight slipped in through the pale shades. She frowned. Her gaze returned to him. He paused in his reading, and she spoke.

"We've lost the blanket."

"Pardon?"

Her head turned in the opposite direction, her eyes taking in the closed door to her room.

"I thought... nevermind." She looked back at him. "You're actually here."

"Of course."

"In the hospital."

"No need to ask the standard neurological questions, I see."

"In the middle of the day."

"Merely mid-morning, Clarice."

"And you're reading... what _are _you reading?"

He held up the book to display the title to her.

"The book cart has truly abominable selections, Clarice. Ghastly."

"And no one's freaking out?"

"About the selections? No, I'm afraid not, my dear. It seems I am the only one horrified by the overabundance of so-called romances and best-selling fiction."

"About _you_, you goof. Being here, in my room, in the middle of the day."

She was vastly more entertaining awake than asleep, he thought. Precisely how did one earn the moniker "goof"? And was it a step up or down from "lazybones"?

The difference in her awareness level in the last thirty-six hours was obvious; the cutback in pain medication had left her sharper, more like her usual self. Still, her inhibitions seemed lowered. A result of the opiate-based drugs or his own presence?

Both, perhaps; she had been playful with him on previous occasions in an undrugged state. The medication merely served to heighten her natural responses. It amused him to note the differences in her behavior with him today when compared to her tone with Jack Crawford on Saturday. She had been closed, suspicious, with Jack. She was open, trusting, with him. He smiled at her, pleased.

"Who would 'freak out', as you say, Clarice? Uncle Jack has gone home to Washington, taking his unnecessary visiting restrictions with him; I saw him board the plane myself. And the nursing staff would hardly begrudge you a visit from a colleague who wished to sit and read to you for a bit."

"A colleague?"

"We work well together, do we not, Clarice?"

She wrinkled her nose and shook her head slightly against the pillow.

"We work _best _together." She paused, her eyes narrowing. "Or I do, anyway."

"I as well, Clarice."

His quick response seemed to have mollified whatever upsetting thought had occurred to her. Did she doubt their partnership still? The sincerity of his interest?

"So we're colleagues today? I should call you…?"

"Agent Thomas, my dear."

She grinned, mischief in her eyes. "Riiiight, Tommy."

"Really, Clarice?"

Her left shoulder shrugged. "Everybody gets a nickname, Doc- _Tommy_."

He resigned himself to the atrocious shortening of his assumed surname, amused by her insistence and good humor. She wanted him here; it was obvious in her every word and gesture. He could tolerate some playfulness of hers at his own expense.

She had fallen silent, staring at him; he was equally content to watch her as her eyes roamed over him. Minutes passed. He allowed a small, satisfied smirk to break free. He knew the instant she had noticed; her face colored slightly and her eyes flicked to his.

"I'm having trouble believing you're here," she offered, fingertips rubbing against the blanket. "Guess I don't have to ask if I made the international news. Did I look that bad, then?"

He returned his thoughts to that morning, three days prior, when his decision to take breakfast at a new café had set in motion the events that would eventually bring him here. The food he had found lacking; he had, in fact, been on the verge of discarding the meal entirely when he had heard Clarice's voice. He remained rooted to the seat as the segment finished. He had never in his life paid such careful attention to a television.

"You looked" – beautiful, bloodied, a warrior goddess defiant in victory but wounded, possibly mortally so – "magnificent."

"Uh-huh." She was eyeing him with skepticism now. "I must've looked half-dead to get you on a plane to Omaha."

"Nonsense." His smile was sly. "I had been meaning to vacation here for some time, Clarice. Your injuries were merely a happy accident."

"No making me laugh." Her left arm shifted, fingers reaching out toward the arm of his chair. He laid the book aside and clasped her hand between his own. Her skin was warm but not fevered. His hands enveloped hers entirely. He quite liked the feeling. "But I'm glad you're here."

He squeezed her hand, lightly, mindful of her bruised and torn flesh. When she made no objection, he left one hand beneath hers and began running his fingers along her arm with the other, watching the points of connection between them. The soft warmth of her skin soothed him, easing tension he hadn't realized he'd been carrying. It had been buried deep, so deep he hadn't consciously recognized its lingering presence.

She spoke then, softly, and he knew she had seen what he had not.

"You were… worried?"

Her voice was hesitant, as though she thought the word inadequate but could not conceive of what the right word might be. He lifted his eyes to hers.

"I was… reminded of how much I enjoy seeing your face every day."

She blinked, but not quickly enough to hide the wet sheen in her eyes. She cleared her throat before she spoke.

"So let's, let's figure out how we can make that happen."

An excellent notion, and one he had been considering as he read to her sleeping form. He had formulated several options; whichever was to be implemented depended solely upon her wishes.

"Have you any thoughts on the matter, Clarice?"

"They're letting me go tomorrow, if I'm no trouble today. But I can't fly home – too soon after surgery. And I can't drive because of the painkillers. I thought maybe I'd hole up in a hotel room for a few days."

"Alone?"

"Yeah, that's the problem. Even if I had… someone… willing to stay with me, I could hardly tell Dee that. So I'd have to tell her I was alone."

She had at least considered the idea of staying with him, then, before practical considerations forced her to discard it. That it was something of a first choice - an instinct - was a strong indication of her acceptance of her own desires. But she was quite correct; such a course of action would create difficulty.

"And what would Ms. Mapp do, Clarice, if you informed her that you would not be home for another week? That you would be staying, injured, in a strange city far from home, all alone?"

"Exactly my problem. She'd take leave and come out to stay with me."

"Will you allow me to provide an alternative, Clarice?"

She watched him intently, her expression a mixture of determination and calculation. It was one he'd seen before – the moment before she unlocked a particularly amusing puzzle.

"You already have, haven't you? Whatever this alternative is, you've already set things in motion, and now you're going to coax me into agreeing with it."

"It's possible," he allowed, "that such a supposition might be correct."

"Possible my ass. I'm right, and you know it. So what's the plan?"

The eager light in her eyes drew him in. Telling her would do no harm… but _not_ telling her might benefit him in other ways. Might make her aware of the depth of her trust in him, a trust she could not hide when she was vulnerable. Might encourage her to _accept_ the depth of her trust in him.

"I'd prefer to surprise you, my dear, if you'll allow it."

Her eyes narrowed.

"You know I'll need to go home. If I disappear now, with my name all over the papers…."

"You'll arrive safely home, Clarice. You have my word."

She nodded, after a moment, and said no more on the subject. The crease between her brows told him something yet bothered her. He traced the tender skin of her inner forearm with his fingers, calling her attention to their intimacy, encouraging her to open herself to him. Her eyes watched his fingertips.

"Jack wants me to lie in my report… to leave out the details. Says the good publicity could erase the… 'Lecter stigma' attached to my career."

"No doubt he's correct in some respects, Clarice. The Tattler's anniversary piece was quite gratuitous, if occasionally accurate by accident."

The article had been a cheap, tawdry mishmash of fact and fiction held together by insinuation and anonymous sources. Precisely the sort of mix guaranteed to fascinate the American public. It did, however, have its high points – including its no-longer-accurate photos of his own face.

"Lovely photo of you, though, my dear. I noted you declined to be interviewed. Feeling shy?"

"Feeling like I wasn't interested in being asked if it was true that you had sent me gifts and how often we had 'consummated' our 'star-crossed union' since your escape."

He smirked, just a bit, at her dry tone.

"Ahh, yes, the consummation. Forgive me, Clarice. Until reading the article, I hadn't realized that I was to be arriving at your office daily to render services of a sexual nature. Over the desk, was it?"

A light flush covered her cheeks, but her tone retained its dry humor.

"Among other places." She grinned at him then. "Our so-called affair is the worst-kept secret at the FBI, you know. If they actually knew the truth, the shock of being proved right would knock them on their asses."

"Would that amuse you, my dear?" It was a carefully neutral query; her life was hers to handle, though he would happily put on a spectacular show for her colleagues if she wished. A very special thank-you for Jack Crawford, to demonstrate his appreciation for sending a Starling to alight on his hand. Yes, that would be… fun.

She seemed to have some inkling of his thoughts, but what he read in her face was interest and consideration rather than disapproval. _You're simply bursting with enticing surprises, my dear._ Finally, though, she sighed.

"Not as much as being able to live openly with you in relative peace, safety, and anonymity would."

Ah. Yes, such a life could prove even more fun. He smiled at her.

"I would enjoy that as well, Clarice."


	10. Chapter 10

The doctor stayed for hours, stepping out only when the nurse made her visits, as though instinctively respecting Clarice's need for privacy without her needing to say a word. Even when Clarice closed her eyes for a moment of rest - and when they stayed closed longer than a moment - he was sitting by her side when she woke.

"I'm sorry," she offered, taking in the lower angle of the sunlight filtering across the room. "I must be boring you, falling asleep all the time."

"Not in the least, Clarice. You'll heal more quickly if you allow your body to follow its own needs during your recovery." He paused a moment before adding, "I'm pleased that you're able to rest. And I find watching you do so a pleasant diversion. It's quite... peaceful."

She stretched out her left arm toward him, hoping he would take her hand as he had done earlier, and he did not disappoint. His open affection - well, open for him, at any rate - was a welcome reminder of just how much she had waiting for her once she had sloughed off her formerly comfortable skin of FBI special agent. It was too tight now, and it itched, and a few careful movements would dislodge it for good without anyone but him seeing the new skin waiting underneath.

She had thought, for a long time now, that this new skin - these new ideas - were wrong. That she was wrong to want them. But it was the outermost layer that was wrong. Superficial.

If she continued on her current path, she would always be fighting to maintain her principles in a sea of politicking, murky waters filled with empty promises, empty smiles, empty hearts. She feared that emptiness would gnaw its way inside her and empty her, too, until she was as superficial as the rest of her colleagues.

But Hannibal Lecter... she studied him, poised elegantly on a vinyl chair he no doubt detested, breathing air polluted with unpleasant antiseptic smells, attentive to her every action with perfect calm despite the risk he placed himself in to be here at all... Hannibal Lecter was not an empty man. The surface he presented to strangers - _that_ was superficial. But the whole of him, the depths, were rich with meaning.

And with him, she could be the same. She might cultivate that layer of superficiality for others - the trivialities of name or hair color or residence - but beneath that, with him, she would be full. And her fullness would be true and just. It would satisfy the desires of her soul without twisting her to meet the requirements of unjust masters, more senior agents and section chiefs who thought to tell her "Stop. Enough. Only this much truth, and no more. Justice for this one, and not for that."

Because Hannibal Lecter would never tell her to stop, would he?

_First principles, Clarice. ... Of each particular thing, ask: What is it in itself? What is its nature?_

No, he would never ask her to deny her nature. Would never demand it of her, would never dangle the promise of reward in exchange for it. He would tell her to examine herself, to confront her true nature, to accept it, to act upon it.

Suddenly certain, she was desperate for his confirmation. Her fingers gripped his more tightly, almost to the point of pain on her abraded skin.

"If I ever needed..."

She faltered, stumbling over what she wanted to ask; when her eyes met his, she saw the spark of interest there. His gaze was intent on hers, and what she saw calmed her, allowed her to slow her thoughts to the coherency and speed her new painkillers would permit to emerge.

"If I needed - for me to be me - if I needed - if _what_ I needed, if it put us in danger..."

He leaned forward and lifted her hand to his mouth, pressing gentle kisses to her knuckles.

"You must act as your nature dictates, Clarice. If such action is risky, we might manage that risk together, hmm? Not to be immodest, but I've some experience with the logistics of difficult situations."

She parsed his meaning more slowly than usual, but it came to her eventually. He was referring to his crimes. The planning. The execution. The way he had escaped detection for so long. And he was watching her even more intently now. Testing her, she realized - but was the test whether she would flinch at the seemingly casual reference to murder or whether she would accept that he, too, would act as his nature dictated?

"'Difficult situations'? Are we entertaining euphemisms now?"

"Not every difficult situation is the sort you're thinking of, Clarice."

"No, but that _is_ the sort you meant."

"Yes." He answered simply, without adornment or prevarication.

"Does every conversation between us have to be a competition? A test?"

"Is that what you feel this is, Clarice?"

"Don't bullshit me. I'm sedated, not stupid."

"Technically, my dear, your prescribed painkillers are not sedatives; that function is merely a side effect."

"Come closer so I can hit you." She tugged lightly, teasingly, on the hand that still held hers inches from his face.

"An enticing offer, but one I believe I'll decline." Despite his words, he tipped his head forward and kissed her knuckles once more.

"Afraid?"

"Only that you might further injure yourself, Clarice."

"I'll delay delivery of the punch until I'm healed, then." She smirked at him.

"Feeling better, my dear?"

"Is that why you teased me? To put me in a better mood?" Manipulation was his style, after all, she thought.

"I goad you because it's in my nature to do so, Clarice. That it simultaneously angers, excites, and relaxes you merely demonstrates that our natures are well-suited to each other."

The slackness in her thinking irritated her; of course he hadn't only been diverting her attention. He had been making a point. One that fed right back into their discussion.

"Even when it comes to 'difficult situations'?"

"Mmm. That is the question on the table, yes. I believe we may come to find our natures are more compatible than it seemed to you at first blush."

"'Seemed to me.' Not to you?"

"I knew what I wanted. And I knew what I sensed in you. It was not difficult to imagine that the two might... intertwine, shall we say? It was only in putting a name to such understanding that I hesitated." He smiled at her, a wry grin, she thought. "I had not imagined that such an emotion should come to rule me."

"Thus the games?"

"They seemed an appropriate means for gauging your own interest and furthering it, Clarice. You must admit, I had very few means at my disposal with which to engage you."

She bit back a giggle, hearing Delia's voice in her mind. _It's not how much a man has - it's how he uses it, girlfriend!_

"You managed, though."

"Because of the choices _you _have made, Clarice. I attempted to make you aware of the options before you. Success was not guaranteed."

No waver entered his voice; he seemed as matter-of-fact as ever. But the admission was more than she had expected from him – an acknowledgement of uncertainty and vulnerability. A statement of her… power… over him, the second such statement in the past few minutes. Much as she appreciated it, though, she wasn't about to thank him for it. Neither of them particularly enjoyed being vulnerable; pointing it out would only make it awkward.

She pulled her fingers from his, waving them with a faux-distracted air.

"Well, I'd hate to be _easy_."

He stood, then, bending over her and brushing her ear with his lips.

"You are infinitely complex, my dear." The lightest kiss at her temple. "I'll return in the morning."

She watched him go, and lay awake for what seemed hours as she considered the nature of the oddly savage and gentle man who loved her. He remained as infinitely complex to her as she was to him, she thought. _But I'll have a lifetime to map that complexity down to the last inch_.

* * *

><p>The doctor dined in his hotel room that night. Though he was alone, his mind returned to feast on the enjoyment of his day with Clarice, an accompaniment that flavored his palate much more pleasingly than the unfortunately overcooked salmon.<p>

It had been a significantly productive day in several respects. Clarice's comfort level with him, of primary concern, had clearly increased, even when the conversation had turned to what might, in her mind, be less savory topics.

She remained disenchanted with Jackie-boy's tactics, another victory.

She had willingly handed him control of the initial days of her recovery, trusting him to arrange matters without contradicting her wishes or forgetting to attend to any of the small details that could so easily put her in a precarious position.

She had rested easily in his presence, neither delaying her scheduled painkillers - Percocet, he noted - nor asking him to leave despite the sedative effect, to which she seemed particularly susceptible and which left her napping periodically after her lunch. Now lunch, he admitted, had clearly been a trial for her.

As he would have expected, given her injuries, she had been presented with soft, bland, semi-liquid choices for her meal. From what little she had eaten, it was not difficult to determine she had found the offerings unappealing. That was an issue that would need to be addressed; her body needed fuel to properly continue the healing process.

But her afternoon naps had provided him with a window to implement his plans. She had slept deeply for fifteen or twenty minutes at a time, awakened enough to converse with moderate attentiveness, and repeated the process several times. And as her hospital room thoughtfully provided a phone, and the calls he had needed to make would be least suspicious coming from the hospital exchange in any case, he had merely waited until she slept deeply enough to allow him to converse in a quiet, professional tone.

The first and third calls had been brisk, a simple matter of arranging details. The second call, however, had required more finesse and the assumption of a flat, Midwestern American accent. Thankfully, he had been provided with more than sufficient examples in the past two days.

Once past the standard greetings and basic explanation for the purpose of his call, he had thoroughly enjoyed himself manipulating Ardelia Mapp. He replayed the experience in his mind, listening once more for any nuances he might have missed, any hint that she had entertained suspicions as they spoke.

"And will someone be home during the day to assist Ms. Starling? She will have difficulty with some tasks in the initial stages of her recovery."

Ms. Mapp's response was as expected; Clarice's assessment had been quite accurate.

"Absolutely. I can take time off of work to stay with her. We're very close."

"I see." He allowed doubt to creep into his tone. "Please be aware that such arrangements can cause difficulty, particularly when the caregiver and patient have a close relationship."

"What do you mean? I told Cee I'd be there for her. I've done it before. I know she'd do the same for me."

"Of course, of course," he soothed her. "As her patient advocate, however, I feel it's important that you understand the magnitude of the undertaking. Would you say that Ms. Starling is typically an independent person?"

Something like a snort echoed in his ear.

"That's an understatement."

"And do you think that she will accept help from you easily? That she will tell you her needs immediately, without embarrassment, and allow you to dictate the terms of her recovery? Without such a dependency causing frustration and long-term resentment, perhaps even a sense of obligation and imbalance, in your friendship with her?"

Ms. Mapp remained silent for a long moment.

"I… hadn't thought of it like that. I mean, I know she'll hate needing help to do anything…." Her voice trailed off into confused uncertainty.

_Excellent. Just a bit more, I think._

"We find patients are often reluctant to cede authority, and caregivers with deeply personal ties are unlikely to enforce it. Such behavior can set back a patient's recovery process, particularly when a patient has no one to whom she can vent her frustrations."

"I don't want to slow her recovery. I know she'll be pushing to get back to work as soon as possible."

No, she won't, he thought, but doubt remained. It was possible he would not truly believe – would not shed such doubts – until the moment she walked away from the FBI and into his arms for the last time. And even then… no. He would have to learn to trust her, to trust that she was ready to accept in full what she wanted so desperately.

"In that case, I would suggest allowing us to arrange for a home health aide to visit on a daily basis until Ms. Starling is past the likely window for re-injury. A uniformed caregiver can provide a sense of authority and a safer target for frustration, which will allow you and Ms. Starling to preserve your friendship during this difficult time."

"That… sounds good, actually."

He could hear the guilty relief in her voice. Ms. Mapp had not been difficult to manage at all, once convinced she was doing the best thing for Clarice. She was, of course, unaware that it was also the best thing for Hannibal Lecter. _Yes, I expect she'd have trouble with that notion._

"Is there anything I need to do to set things up?"

"Not at all; I'll simply make the arrangements in the system and Ms. Starling will be provided with appropriate assistance during her convalescence."

"There's nothing I can do? To help?"

Ah, of course. A caregiver without a task felt a certain helplessness–

_Something you're familiar with, Doctor?_

_So formal, Clarice?_

_It's your mind. If you want to change my behavior here, I can't stop you._

That was true enough, he allowed, and yet there was something charmingly _Clarice_ about her use of formal address when speaking to him even in his own mind. He smoothly shifted his thoughts back to Ms. Mapp even as his eyes studied his sleeping Starling.

"Actually, there is one thing that would simplify matters."

Ms. Mapp had, of course, rapidly agreed. She wanted very much to help Clarice; it was only her limited understanding of her friend's needs that made her a poor companion. But that was for the best, he thought, pushing the remains of his dinner and the memory aside and rising from the table.

After all, with properly supportive friends, Clarice might never have come to rely upon him at all. And that was a possibility he greatly preferred not to contemplate.


	11. Chapter 11

Clarice Starling did not consider herself the sort of woman who looked into her closet and complained of having nothing to wear. Impoverished as a child, institutionalized as a teen, she had learned early to make do.

But after an evening exam by her primary physician that added to her soreness, after reading and signing an explanation of her restrictions on her discharge papers, after consuming – partially – a dinner as tasteless as breakfast and lunch had been, after sleeping what seemed like only moments before being awakened Tuesday at four-thirty in the morning… she was just about ready to admit defeat when confronted by the contents of her travel bags.

She had worn her most comfortable clothes – loose-fitting cargo pants, a soft cotton T-shirt, a dress casual button-down – on Thursday. The shredded and bloodied remains had likely been cut from her body and eventually tossed in evidence bags.

That left her with workout clothes – entirely unsuitable – and two basic professional pantsuits with mix-and-match camisoles. Great for the office or speaking with grieving families. Not so great for a woman with stitched-up cuts and whopping bruises splashed across her torso, a woman who could barely raise one arm and wasn't going to be able to bend over and tie her own damn shoes for weeks.

She was giving serious thought to dressing in her pajamas when the nurse came in – Marjorie again.

"Your friend from yesterday is back." Nurse Marjorie's arched eyebrow and conspiratorial smile clearly conveyed what she thought of that. "I'm glad today is my long shift, or I would have missed him. And that man is not to be missed."

Clarice bit back a laugh at the idea that she was in a gossipy girl-talk conversation about Hannibal Lecter and his not-so-secret crush on her. _Imagine her face if we were gossiping about real secrets._ But that made her think of Ardelia, and that stirred up worries about what the next few weeks of her life would look like.

"He's a good guy," she managed, without a trace of irony.

The nurse set two small boxes on the bed. No brown paper wrapping, but Clarice's fingers automatically reached out to stroke the surface.

"He sent this along for you – said it'd probably be helpful."

Clarice mentally translated the nurse's words to Lecterese.

_I expect the contents will be of assistance, Clarice._

She pulled off the first lid to find a dress – though not the sort of dress she'd ever worn, and not the sort of dress she'd have expected him to select. It wasn't fashionable, for one thing, and god knew Hannibal Lecter appreciated fashion. In fact, she thought, laying the dress out on the bed, the style screamed something more like 19th-century farmwife.

But the nurse was nodding.

"He's a clever one, too. That'll be comfortable and easy for you to get on and off by yourself."

Clarice re-examined the dress with a more critical eye. The long sleeves and ankle-length skirt would hide nearly all of her bruises; wherever they were going, no one would be staring at her because of them. The buttons running down the front from the neck to the knee meant she wouldn't need to bend or twist or lift her arms; she would keep her independence. And the loose fit, the extra-high waist just under the bodice, meant nothing would constrict her abdomen or put pressure on her wounds. The fabric was soft; a heavy cotton, she thought.

Nosy Nurse Marjorie was right; he'd given her something with an eye toward comfort. There was even a soft cotton bra in the box, one that wouldn't rub harshly against her bandages or cut into her bruises. If she hadn't seen the drawer full of undergarments in her room in Saarbrucken, she might have been irritated by his presumption. _He's not forcing me to wear them; he's just offering me the choice._

"Yeah, he's thoughtful like that." She opened the second box; a pair of slip-on shoes, solid navy flats to match the dress, rested within. _Won't need to worry about tying shoelaces with these._

"I can't think of any guys I know who'd be _that_ considerate."

Clarice flashed a small smile before turning her attention to unfastening the buttons.

"Could you tell him I'll just be a few minutes?"

"Sure thing. You sit tight, though – no running off once you're dressed. I'll be back with a wheelchair. Hospital policy."

"Yeah, I know. I signed the papers already." And she wasn't even going to argue about it; conserving her energy was the smart move when she could hardly walk ten steps without tiring. It was frustrating as all hell, but that didn't mean she was going to be a stubborn idiot about it.

Nurse Marjorie closed the door behind her, and Clarice hurriedly dressed. Well, _attempted_ to hurriedly dress was more like it, she thought, as even the easy-to-don outfit required an expenditure of energy that left her a bit wobbly. She sat on the bed, breathing slowly, as she waited for the nurse to return.

The wheelchair was cold when she got in, tucking the dress around her legs to keep it from tangling with the wheels. An orderly grabbed her garment bag and duffel at the nurse's direction. Finally, they pushed her down the hall to the nurses' station and the small seating area where the doctor stood, a warm smile on his face as she approached.

"Not running out on your own two feet, Clarice?"

He draped a winter coat over her, a long woolen dress coat that certainly hadn't been among the things she had brought with her to Omaha. His fingers brushed her cheek as he tucked it in around her. She resisted the urge to nuzzle his hand and curl into the coat's warmth.

"Don't tempt me, _Tommy._"

The doctor shook his head, emitting a resigned sigh for the benefit of their audience, she thought.

Clarice made her farewells to the nursing staff as the doctor accepted her bags. She had no idea where she was going, but she was eager to get there all the same. _He's got this. I don't have to worry about a thing._

* * *

><p>Hannibal Lecter navigated the scant early morning traffic Tuesday in downtown Omaha with ease. It was nothing to worry over; they were running precisely on schedule. The sky was dark yet, with true sunrise still nearly two hours off, and a light fog smothered the streets and diffused the glow of the headlights.<p>

Though he kept his face turned to the road, he remained attuned to Clarice in his peripheral vision. The faint light of the instrument panel provided sufficient illumination for him, though perhaps less so for her. She held herself somewhat rigidly in the passenger seat, unnaturally upright; he expected the dueling difficulties of alleviating the pressure on her bruised back and preventing the abdominal crunching effect of a slouch on her stab wound made sitting troublesome.

The effort was undoubtedly taxing, and the continual drift of her eyelids toward a closed position indicated the scarcity of her resources. That she was tired and in pain did not surprise him; he had, after all, made arrangements with the medical staff to roust her from her sleep unnaturally early so that her exit from the hospital would be completed in time for their journey.

"Is the pain tolerable, Clarice?"

She blinked; her head tipped slightly toward him.

"Yeah, the drugs are doing their job. I'm just…."

He waited in silence. She was not accustomed to complaining, he expected; like himself, she had no desire to display weakness in front of others, and she had been raised in an environment that fostered a sense of self-reliance. It would be a change for them both, this having of someone on whom to depend – and in whom to confide.

"Exhausted," she finished. "I stand up for five minutes and I'm exhausted. I walk ten steps and I'm exhausted. I'm already tired of being tired, and they warned me it would be months before I'm back up to full speed."

She shook her head once, in irritation perhaps.

"Sorry. I just need to suck it up and get on with it. But if you're driving us all the way to D.C., I don't think I'll be able to keep my eyes open past the first cornfield."

"There's no need to apologize, Clarice. Expressing frustration with the current state of affairs is hardly unexpected or unwarranted. And, as it happens, we will not be driving to Washington. It's a twenty-hour trip. Much too long for you to be confined in a single position. And were I driving, my attention would, of necessity, be focused on the road. I would greatly prefer to focus my attention on you while I have the opportunity, my dear."

Her head moved in his peripheral vision; he perceived she was studying him as best she could in the low light.

"You're very… direct… today, Doctor." Her tone seemed deliberately casual.

"Perhaps I am."

"Because…." Her pause was long, but her statement had been thoughtful rather than leading, and he expected she merely needed additional time to gather her thoughts. "You think subtlety would fly right over my head."

"Percocet may diminish your ability to rapidly comprehend complexity, Clarice. It's a temporary situation. You may be assured, I will limit myself to more subtle attentions when circumstances dictate."

She blinked; her mouth curved in a slight frown.

"I like your attentions. Subtle and otherwise. I like you."

"Mmm. You do," he agreed. "But you would be unlikely to say so in such an open fashion were you not feeling…."

"Detached," he finished, just as she responded, "Loose."

He smiled, just a bit.

"I suspect we are not, at this moment, defining 'loose' in the same manner, Clarice. It is not a word I would associate with you."

Her frown had returned; a tiny furrow between her eyebrows accompanied it. And then she laughed, a somewhat startled bark, and her hand went to her side – a reflex action, he judged.

"Because I'm not having sex with anyone other than you, you mean."

It was his turn for reflexive action, as his head turned toward her and his eyes briefly strayed from the road.

"I am quite certain, Clarice, that we have not engaged in such activities." Though he was, of course, pleased to hear her confirmation of his suspicion. Clarice Starling was not the type of woman to find a substitute while she was contemplating a decision about his own stated intentions for them. It reflected well upon her emotional commitment to him; as, he supposed, his own celibacy during their time apart reflected the same of his commitment to her. His smile grew. "I would remember, I'm sure."

"Not yet," she said. "But we will."

Her head bobbed in a firm nod.

_So, it's decided then, Clarice? And when it happens, will it be merely that for you, or will it mean something more?_

But he nodded as well.

"When the time is right, my dear. All good things to those who wait."

It was not a discussion he wished to continue now, while she was injured and medicated and he would be spending the next thirty hours in close quarters with her. As a gentleman, he would, of course, conduct himself with unquestionable propriety. But her lowered inhibitions could become difficult if not properly directed, particularly as he did not wish to push her away.

She was relaxed and open with him now, as comfortable with his unconstrained presence as she had once been with the safety of glass between them. More importantly, she was comfortable with _herself _as she had not been during their time together in Saarbrucken. He could not allow her to backslide, to return to the FBI and take refuge there. He would not find himself standing at her graveside after a life spent chiefly apart.

He shook off the thought as he pulled the car into the parking lot and selected a space near the building. He would not be returning the vehicle to the rental counter; he had made arrangements last night to leave the keys and the payment in the glove box, with an additional fee for pickup service. He cut the engine.

"Clarice?" She had been silent for several minutes. Thinking deeply, or distracted by pain?

"You're very good at waiting, Doctor." She lifted her head and looked at their surroundings. "We're taking a train?"

"We are," he confirmed. "If you'll wait here a moment, I'll return presently."

He would need to confirm their ticketing reservation and obtain a wheelchair before returning for her; the distance was too great for her to walk. But when he had done so, he found her slumbering in the passenger seat.

He shifted her carefully, tucking her coat around her and hefting their bags over his shoulder afterward. She did not stir as they boarded the train, nor did she do so when he moved her gently to the window seat, taking the aisle for himself. He watched her sleep as the train headed north, his fingers circling her wrist, monitoring her pulse, grounding him with its slow, steady beat.


	12. Chapter 12

Something was touching the back of her hand. Warm, and gentle, and just the slightest bit ticklish. Fingers. Tracing shapes.

Eyes still closed, Clarice smiled. _Hannibal._

He was nothing if not attentive. _Must be time to get out of the car. Getting from here to the train is gonna suck. OK. Just go slow, and don't have a fucking meltdown._

She opened her eyes. To… not the car. There was an empty seat in front of her, not a windshield. And even though it was still dark out through the window to her left, she could tell that they were moving.

"We're on the train." She wished she didn't sound quite so surprised, but she couldn't help it. "When did we get on the train?"

"Not so very long ago, Clarice. Perhaps thirty minutes."

"I don't remember it." _Am I having blackouts? That's not one of the side effects, is it? If it is, I'm not taking any—_

The doctor's fingers tapped lightly against her wrist.

"Calmly, Clarice. Nice, slow breaths, hmm? Breathe in… one… two… three… four… five… six… seven… breathe out… one… two…." He counted in a steady voice. She hadn't realized she was breathing so fast, but now that he mentioned it, she could feel the fiery pain spreading through her side. He kept counting, and she concentrated only on the sound of his voice and the feel of his fingers. He was keeping track of her pulse, she realized, as her breathing slowed.

"Yes, that's better, isn't it, my dear?"

She nodded, a bit shakily.

"Much."

"It seems I owe you an apology, Clarice. I had not anticipated that you would be so distressed upon awakening. You were sleeping quite soundly when I returned to the car."

Embarrassed now, she turned her head to the window.

"Sorry. You don't need to apologize. I was… I just didn't know how I got here."

He was silent for so long that she turned back to look at him. When he spoke, his voice was soft.

"Do you not know, Clarice, even now?"

She frowned, sensing he meant something… more, something beyond knowing how she had gotten to the train.

"You will never come to harm in my presence if I may prevent it, Clarice." His fingers lingered on the small wounds marring her hand. "I would not have allowed anything untoward to happen to you, not in the past thirty-three minutes nor at any other time when you have granted me the opportunity to care for you."

_Shit. I hurt him again. Fix it, now._

"I know that. I didn't think you would. I was… afraid… that I was blacking out. Missing time. I can't believe I got from there to here without waking up, that's all."

Because if she was missing time, she was missing time _with him._ And she already knew her time with him was limited; she couldn't run away with him now without causing suspicion. Once they arrived in D.C., it would be weeks, at least, before she could see him again. Before she could discard the trappings of her old life and begin anew with him.

She sighed and spoke before thinking.

"I wish we could just go now."

"We may, if you wish, Clarice."

Of course he had followed her train of thought instantly. But wishes were wishes for a reason; they weren't reality.

"And leave too many questions behind, and Dee thinking I wouldn't have just disappeared like that, and Jack poking his nose into things… we'd be chased. Hunted." And there were things she wanted there – not many, but a few, that were too precious to leave behind.

"Yes, to all of those, Clarice. But they are immaterial. If you wish to select a destination other than Washington, you need only say so and I will make alternate arrangements during our stop in Chicago. I cannot deny that having you in such close proximity encourages in me a desire to make it a permanent state."

"Even if you had to spend weeks on nursing duty, Doctor? I'm hardly at my best."

"Even then, Clarice. I believe the clichéd turn of phrase is 'in sickness and in health,' is it not?"

He delivered the loaded words in the lightest possible tone, and she was stunned by how calmly she took the informal proposal. Maybe she could blame the drugs. Or maybe it was just… expected. The casual confirmation of his intentions for a lifetime commitment, and her equally casual agreement. Her mind and body had already made the decision; for once, there was no opposition piping up from within her in a tiny, nagging voice.

Their hands lay tangled on the armrest between them. She slipped her hand out from beneath his and stroked his fingers.

"I'd rather we started in health and happiness, without needing to look over our shoulders quite so much."

He lifted her hand and kissed her knuckles.

"And so we shall."

She drifted off to sleep again still enjoying the feel of her hand in his. When she woke, the doctor was setting a bowl of… _something_… in front of her. Oatmeal, she thought, after studying it for a moment.

"Excellent timing, Clarice. I believe breakfast is in order."

Plain oatmeal. And a cup of tea. Her stitches itched, her back was sore, her abdomen was starting to throb again despite the painkillers, and he wanted her to eat fucking oatmeal?

A scathing reply was on the verge of arrival when she noticed the tray atop his table. A second bowl of unadorned oatmeal. A second cup of tea. Suddenly, the question was no longer whether this bland crap met the minimum standard for the word "breakfast."

Curious, she looked from the tray to his face.

"You're willingly subjecting yourself to this?"

She couldn't imagine he would ingest something so tasteless, not after years of state-provided meals at the asylum. For a man with such acute senses, for whom taste and smell commanded equal importance with sight and sound, such unappetizing meals had undoubtedly been a form of torture. He couldn't possibly _want _to eat beige mush.

"It would be unseemly to feast when you cannot, my dear. I'm not forgoing all that much in any case; the fare here is hardly up to my preferred standards. It would be... difficult... though not impossible, for the staff to, ah-"

"Mess up this glop?"

"Indeed. You took the very words from my mouth, Clarice."

She grinned, holding back the laugh that wanted to spill forth and upset her muscles. "I'll just bet I did."

She lifted the spoon over her bowl, saluting him briefly, and tried the glop.

"Mmmmmm, bland."

"Your tender intestines will thank you for it later, Clarice."

She grimaced. "Thanks for the reminder."

"If you'll wait a moment, however…." He reached into his jacket pocket and retrieved something with the flair of a magician in a silent movie. He held up a single finger before tapping the lid of a small jar.

A homemade jelly jar, she thought, though smaller than the kind her mother had used to put up black cherry and pawpaw preserves, and without a colorful scrap of fabric between the lid and the sealing ring. Jar after jar, lined up neatly in the cupboard, even a year after her mother's death. She could still recall the look of pain on her father's face when the last jar had gone and she had turned up her nose at store-bought jam, insisting she wanted it like Momma made it.

The doctor wiggled his fingers teasingly, as though he needed to loosen them up for such a dramatic feat of strength as jar-opening. She found herself smiling, practically grinning like a child, as he removed the lid and set it on the table.

He made a show of picking up his own as-yet-unused spoon from the place setting and dipping it into the jar. The glass was opaque; she couldn't see the color of the contents until he lifted the spoon back over the rim. A heaping mound of darkness, so black it shone purple.

The dollop landed precisely in the center of her uninspired oatmeal. She studied it for a moment. Some kind of berries. Blueberries? She glanced over at him; he raised an eyebrow in challenge.

She pursed her lips, picked up her spoon, and sampled the fruit. The flavor greatly enhanced the bland dish, and she briefly closed her eyes, chasing the thread of memory that told her she recognized it.

_Got it._

She opened her eyes and raised a brow at him in return.

"Do you always carry blackberry jam in your pocket?"

"Compote," he corrected. "And only on special occasions."

He spooned some of the jam – _compote_ – onto his own oatmeal and replaced the lid on the jar. She took another bite.

"Did you make this?" She pictured him in a kitchen, wearing an apron, keeping close watch on simmering berries, and found it didn't strike her as odd at all.

"I did, yes. It was an attempt at a new mixture, with an added lemon zest."

Surely he hadn't made it _here_, though – which meant he had brought it with him, from wherever he had been before he had dropped everything to visit her. A snack, maybe, something special to spread on an English muffin or a pastry of some kind, maybe even something he was saving for his flight back. Only now he was sharing it with _her_, and whatever they didn't finish would probably be wasted without refrigeration.

And how surreal was it, that she was sitting on a train heading to Chicago discussing recipes for homemade preserves with Hannibal Lecter? _Or I've completely lost it, and these drugs are just that good._

"My mother used to put up preserves," she said, between bites. With the addition of the sweetened fruit to her oatmeal, her appetite seemed suddenly insatiable. "The blackberries grew wild down by the crick."

"Mmm. Our cook did the same. I believe I managed to eat nearly as many berries as I picked."

_Holy shit._ He was sharing. Unprompted. Just… casually talking about his childhood. No – not just that. _About how our childhoods were similar. For chrissake, Starling, don't gawk at the man – say something._

"I dunno about you, but for me the worst part was standing still afterward for the scrubbing. And the purple stains just wouldn't come off." She thought for a moment, trying to recall the long-ago days. "I think the first time, my daddy had to pinky swear that my fingers wouldn't stay that color forever."

She looked down at her hands and shook her head; the bruising around the torn skin had left portions of her fingers shaded purple.

"I wore gloves," the doctor said. "Thick workman's gloves. Quite rough."

Clarice couldn't help laughing, despite the ripple of pain in her abdomen from the movement. Of course he had thought to wear gloves. Even as a child, Hannibal Lecter would have been a planner. She felt a rush of affection for him.

"I'm not surprised. That just means you needed a friend to mash berries in your face until you looked as purple as a grape popsicle."

A friend like her, she thought. It was a ridiculous suggestion; she hadn't even been born yet when he was deftly avoiding brambles and remembering to wear gloves. But when she looked over to gauge his response, he was studying her with some seriousness.

"I'll be certain to keep that in mind, Clarice, should we venture into a blackberry patch together in the future. Be advised, however, that turnabout is fair play."

And then he smiled at her, a wickedly playful smile, and her brain latched onto a single thought: _How close is the nearest blackberry patch?_

* * *

><p>Amusing Clarice Starling was, the doctor decided, perhaps even more enjoyable than angering her. The day had passed quickly – too quickly for his taste, as each hour brought them closer to their destination, to the moment they would part ways once more – and he had attempted to maintain a light tone to distract her from her discomforts.<p>

She had played along, for the most part, proving to be a charming traveling companion despite the frustration he could sense simmering beneath the surface. He could not have successfully distracted her without some effort, some willingness, on her part.

The compote had been a stroke of good fortune, a treat he had not opened on his journey west, his mind too deeply embroiled in thoughts of Clarice's condition to remind him to eat. That she had found it palatable – no, more than that – pleased him immensely. It would be important to keep her appetite engaged to encourage her recovery.

She had slept again afterward, a result of taking her painkillers. Lunch had been a chicken and vegetable soup – clearly prepackaged, its lack of taste covered with an abundance of sodium. He had offered to make a game of it, teasingly challenging her to finish her bowl by promising to eat a spoonful of his own for every one she swallowed of hers – a shared torture. It was one of the few moments in which lightness had failed him; she simply shook her head and turned back to her bowl.

"You don't have to suffer for me, Doctor. I know what soup from a can tastes like, and I can't imagine you really want to eat a whole bowl of it. And yeah, I know I need to eat it for the calories and the protein and whatever. Just… talk to me. Tell me… tell me how you would make chicken soup. From scratch. You've done that, right?"

"Many times, Clarice."

"So tell me about it."

And he had. She had been an engaged audience, her questions expanding the scope of their discussion to other dishes, and eventually to the challenge of preparing multiple courses, and finally to the intricacies of dinner parties, until he somehow found himself telling her of his own brief appearances at such events in his childhood, smartly dressed and silent, copying his father's mannerisms until he was sent off to bed.

It had been, he thought now, an excellent example of subtle maneuvering on her part. He had not seen the conversational turn in advance – he had, in fact, expected that her leading questions about dinner parties would carry them toward a discussion of his adventures as an adult, perhaps even a questioning of whether he had truly served human flesh to his guests and why. But she had surprised him, smoothly suggesting that his hosting skills must have come from some childhood training.

"My daddy wasn't much for cooking at all – I couldn't hardly set a table properly by the time the Lutheran Home got its hands on me, let alone plan a feast – but I'll bet you knew which fork to use before you could walk."

She had startled a laugh from him, then, and looked quite pleased with herself for it.

"Not quite so early, Clarice, no, but certainly while I was still in short pants and knee socks."

She had tipped her head sideways, then, peering teasingly at his legs, safely encased in trousers.

"Tell me more about these exotic clothes of yours, Doctor."

And thus had fashion occupied them for the remainder of the afternoon. He had described visits from the tailor, whose handcrafted efforts had made certain he would uphold the proper honor and dignity of his family; Clarice had described visits to the local thrift shop and church basements, where she had selected the slightly oversized secondhand items she was least likely to grow out of before the turn of the season.

But amusement could only last so long, once Clarice had run up against her current limitations. He would now have to settle for angering her.

"I could've walked, you know."

The doctor looked down at Clarice's upturned face. She had been less than overjoyed to discover that he had arranged for the loan of a wheelchair from the railway as they changed trains in Chicago. Her mood had soured further as she realized she would not even be able to propel herself, not with the limited motion of her right arm and the damaged skin on her hands.

"A short distance, yes. Across the station to catch our overnight accommodations before they depart? I don't believe you could have, Clarice. Tell me, how many steps was it you suggested you could take this morning before succumbing to exhaustion? Ten? And how many steps would you estimate we have traveled since we disembarked from the train, hmm? More than ten, would you say?"

"Forty-two." Her voice was sharp; he could almost hear the fatigue pressing at her. She tipped her head forward again, staring straight ahead. "Forty-three… four… five… need I go on, Doctor?"

"No, Clarice. You've amply demonstrated both your ability to count and your need for a nap."

She growled. Her foot kicked the side of the wheelchair's footrest, briefly necessitating a course correction, and prompting a sharp inhalation from her as the movement reverberated up her spine.

"Fuck. I hate this. I hate feeling so…."

"Confined? Is it difficult, Clarice, to allow others to make decisions for you, to be directed at their whims?" He allowed the edge in his voice to sharpen, careful to keep his voice low, well below the hearing of the thin crowd of other passengers hurrying to their destinations. "Shall I strap you in? Recommend a face mask, perhaps? I'm quite the connoisseur, you know."

"What, you want me to feel sorry for you? You made choices, Doctor, and that's where they landed you. So forgive me if I can't muster any sympathy right now."

"Ah, yes, poor, pitiful Clarice, who surely didn't make choices that led her to this moment. How convenient it must be to have some higher authority to blame for one's choices. Shall we give Uncle Jack a call?" Mentioning Jack Crawford had made the edge in his voice less deliberate and more true feeling; he cautioned himself not too push too far. "Perhaps he'll encourage you to walk across the train station unassisted. Nevermind that such action would end with you returning to a hospital bed, Clarice. Uncle Jack seems to enjoy seeing you weak and vulnerable. If that is the outcome you desire, by all means, stand up."

He stopped their forward motion and waited. They had time yet, before they needed to board their connection to D.C. If Clarice required a demonstration of her own limitations, he would indulge her until she put herself at risk. He politely ignored the creative swearing as she vented her frustration.

Eventually, her quiet tirade slowed and stopped. Her breathing was loud in the silence before she returned to normal speech.

"Am I making us late, Doctor, or did you build in extra time for my temper tantrum?"

He smoothly returned to pushing the chair.

"Extra time, Clarice, of course. Would you care to swear at me over it while we move?" He kept his tone light, rather than challenging. "You've some quite innovative expressions that I don't believe I've heard before, and I did spend years within earshot of some very colorful characters."

She shook her head, but he could see the smile on her face.

"I'll pass this time, Doctor. I think I'll keep the option in reserve, though."


	13. Chapter 13

She owed him an apology.

Not for her partial meltdown in the station - although throwing his incarceration in his face hadn't been one of her finest moments, she readily admitted, and her reflection agreed. No, she owed him an apology for more than that. And he might not even accept it. No, he would accept it - would be gracious about it, even - but it wouldn't _mean _anything to him.

Clarice finished unbuttoning her dress, slid it carefully off, and set it aside. The bra and panties followed. The latter was difficult to manage without bending and twisting, and she paused to breathe afterward, nice and slow, ignoring the pain that prodded more sharply now. She was due for another pill, just as soon as she finished getting ready for bed. She could hear him outside the bathroom door - well, no, technically she could hear the mechanisms working as he shifted the compartment's seats into their nighttime position; his own movements were silent as always.

She let her eyes skate past her now-nude reflection; the bruising radiating from the bandage on her right wasn't something she cared to see more than she had to. The built-in shower drew a tempting glance, but she knew she'd never manage it tonight. She was already exhausted. _In the morning, for sure. No matter what he says about it. _She brushed her teeth and then wet a washcloth in the sink instead, to wipe down what wasn't covered by bandages or too tender to the touch or out of reach without movements she couldn't make.

When she was ready, she sorted the bundle he had handed her on her way in. It wasn't her pajamas from her duffel, that was obvious. She leaned her weight on the wall and carefully raised her legs one at a time to get the clean underwear on. It made her back throb, but it was better than trying to bend over and collapsing to the floor. Then she lifted the nightgown. Buttons. Large, easy-to-work buttons.

_I bet he's already got something for tomorrow, too. Because he was thinking of all this stuff while you were lying on your ass in that damn bed. And then he puts up with your moodiness all day, and he only fights with you because he knows you're a massive pile of frustration and you need the chance to be angry at __**something**__, dammit. _

Oh yeah. She _definitely_ owed him an apology.

The fabric was a soft cotton flannel in a deep jewel green. The buttons had been left undone; she needed only to slip the gown on, one arm at a time, and fasten them.

He was meticulous about her care. And she had savaged him for it. Her words hadn't been untrue – neither had his in response – but hers had been unkind. And he hadn't batted an eye.

What had it been like for him? Certainly worse than this was for her; she had ceded control to him willingly, for all that she chafed at the restrictions necessary for her health. He, she expected, had never ceded control, no matter what tactics Frederick Chilton had employed. He had maintained perfect freedom in his thoughts – but everything else, to the last detail, had been at the whim of others.

And yet he had never been less than neatly put together when she had visited, had never seemed less than self-possessed. Had it bothered him? The shapeless, dull uniforms, the lack of adequate shaving supplies… she had heard the pleasure in his voice this afternoon as he had described being properly attired, a credit to his family in childhood. Wearing the same drab uniforms for years must have discomfited him, even if he hadn't shown it. What had he said yesterday?

_I had very few means at my disposal with which to engage you._

If he had never been caught… if they had met some other way… would he have gone to such effort to attract her notice? Fancy clothes, fancy meals, fancy concerts… and all he had truly needed, she admitted, was his voice, his insight, and his attentiveness. Everything else was just a token, an extension of his regard, a reminder of his care.

He knew what it was to receive careless care, and the pains he took on her behalf made it clear that his care of her – every moment of it – was chosen with her wishes in mind.

She closed the final button and smoothed the fabric of the nightgown. He certainly hadn't chosen it for _his_ benefit; it wasn't anything like the one he'd sent her on Valentine's Day. No, this gown was designed to make her feel protected – covered and comforted – like a warm embrace.

To him, her needs came first. _She_ came first. And that was something she hadn't felt since her father's death. Did the doctor – _Hannibal_, she reminded herself – miss that feeling, too? Of being put first by someone else?

Or did he lavish attention on her because he missed the opposite feeling – the satisfaction of having someone else in his life to put first? She knew his mother must have put him first when he was young, at least; it was evident in the way he talked about her, when he did. And then he'd had a younger sister. Had he cherished his sister then the way he was cherishing her now?

Was his attentive care part of his nature? Something he _needed_ to do for those he thought of with fondness? Something he had learned from watching his father's behavior or from hearing his mother's admonitions to be a gentleman? Maybe… something that made him feel connected to them still?

She was subdued when she emerged from the bathroom, lost in thought, but the doctor didn't question her. He merely helped her sit on the converted bed and offered her the pills with a bottle of water. She swallowed them gratefully. He capped the water and set it aside. She needed to lie down, she knew, but getting there was going to hurt. If she balanced her weight on her left arm, maybe, she could avoid – but he moved faster than her thoughts, tipping her into his arms and laying her against the mattress before she had time to feel any pain at all.

She blinked at him as he pulled the sheet and the blanket over her and tucked them near her chin. She wriggled her left arm free, though she knew she hardly had the strength to pull him back if he chose to depart. His expression gave nothing away; she couldn't be certain what he was thinking. But she still owed him that apology… and maybe, maybe, she could find a way to show him what it _meant._

"I'm sorry, you know. For hurting you."

He glanced down at himself in feigned surprise.

"I appear to be quite unhurt, my dear."

"Don't do that." Her glare was a little ineffective, maybe, given that she couldn't put much force behind it, but she knew he would read her intent in it. "I mean it – I'm sorry."

He did not pretend to misunderstand her, but he shook his head lightly.

"There is no need, Clarice. No regrets, hmm?"

"That works for you, I know, and maybe it will work for me, too, but that's not… I don't regret leaving you in June and I don't regret going into that house and rescuing that little girl. I needed to do those things for me. But I'm _sorry_ that I hurt you by leaving and I'm _sorry_ that I worried you so much that you risked yourself to come here. And I need you to know that."

"I know, Clarice."

"I need you to know that you're important to me. That your feelings are important to me, even when I don't always know what they are and even when you think you need to break them down and analyze them and put them away and even when I feel I have to go off and do stupidly independent things."

She was tensing her muscles in her urgency to convey the… seriousness… of her words, and it was threatening to make the ache in her abdomen turn into a throbbing pain. The words that would have made her intent clear, that should have been simple to say, would not come.

The last time she had said the words "I love you" to anyone, her voice had been childishly determined. It had been a mantra – if she said it enough, Daddy would wake up and smile at her and call her pumpkin and set her beside him on the bench seat in the pickup and drive down to the crick and teach her to lure the bluegills into biting.

But he never woke up. She hadn't said it enough, or in the right way, or with enough feeling. Tears and begging were of no use. And she would never say those words again, never trust them again once they had failed her. Not to her caretakers at the Lutheran Home; not to her friends, even Ardelia; not to the few men she had allowed in her bed.

It hadn't mattered, then, because she hadn't wanted to say the words anyway. But now, when she so desperately wanted him to know, she couldn't find the words, couldn't force them past the panicked swelling in her throat.

_If you tell him, something bad will happen. He'll leave you. They'll take him away. __ You'll lose him forever and you'll be alone again._

And that loneliness, that feeling she had so accustomed herself to, would be unbearable now, she knew. He was so deeply embedded in her soul now that ripping him out would kill her. But if she never told him… if he never knew… that thought was unbearable, too.

"I know," he repeated, his words somehow both more firmly stated and in a softer tone than before. His hand came to rest on her shoulder, fingers gently massaging. "You needn't stress yourself trying to say so, Clarice. I understand you quite well. The things you tell me without words are just as powerful as those you articulate specifically."

Her heart was galloping faster than the rhythmic thrumming of the train moving beneath her, and every lub-dub hammered a single thought into her brain. _Love you. Love you. Love you._

He leaned closer, then, sweeping her hair back from her face and pressing his lips to her ear.

"I know."

* * *

><p>She shivered when his lips moved over her ear.<p>

He pulled back slowly, steadily; he studied her face. Her body was more relaxed now, and the pain in her face had receded.

It was, of course, possible that her painkiller had had a near-immediate placebo effect… but he did not believe that to be the case. His reassurances were the more likely cause, he expected.

Her attachment to him was quite strong, for all that she had not yet spoken the words. The evidence pointed toward the existence of the emotion. And yet… love was something like quantum mechanics, he expected. Should he attempt to measure her devotion to him, he might collapse the system entirely. Whether she loved him or not, she held the knowledge within the closed system of her mental landscape. Forcing her to reach a decision point, attempting to observe the phenomenon, could give rise to an answer he did not wish to hear.

She still struggled with her love for him, or something related to it, and her seeming uncertainty woke an answering… anxiety… in him. It was a flaw, an insecurity he had never before encountered. He had once been quite certain of his father's pride in him, his mother's sheltering love, his sister's pure devotion. And when they had left him, he no longer had any desire for such things. For such ties.

But he very much wanted such ties with Clarice Starling.

He sat on the edge of the bunk, level with her hip. The back of her hand brushed the outside of his thigh.

"Stay?"

Her voice was small, tentative.

He had not intended to leave at all, though he had of course booked a separate accommodation for himself. Records reflecting that Clarice had traveled home with an unknown male companion would have been unwise.

Still, he was pleased to have been asked.

"Of course, my dear. If you promise to rest, hmm?"

"You too?"

He tipped his head back to study the upper berth, which remained in its upright position against the wall. It would be a matter of minutes to set up the bed, if she intended to persist in demanding that he rest. The Percocet would likely put her to sleep long before he needed to pretend to make use of the thing.

"Certainly, Clarice, though you are rather more in need of rest than I. I'll make up the other bed if you wish."

"No, I mean—" She paused to yawn, turning her face to the wall and exposing the line of her throat to him. "Sorry. I mean rest here. With me."

Her hand moved over the coverlet beside his leg. The lower berth was the same width as a standard household single bed, the sort a child or teen might use, though the provided pillows were enough for two. But he would not put her at risk for re-injury by crowding her.

"That might be unwise, my dear." He spoke gently, if matter-of-factly. He would not have her see a declined invitation as a rejection. "The bunk is narrow, and I don't wish to jostle you."

She raised an eyebrow, a somewhat odd look on her just now, given that her eyelids had slipped half-closed.

"Lazy excuse." Neither anger nor hurt colored her tone, at least; her accusation seemed more… teasing. Drowsiness, perhaps, was not the only side effect of the Percocet she was experiencing; euphoria was common in the initial stages, and it seemed consistent with her behavior yesterday and today. Such a detailed understanding of her responses was helpful information to have, should he ever need treat her himself. "You're the most careful man I know… an' I s'pose I know you don't wanna hurt me."

"Mmm. No, not for the world, my dear."

"Then lie down with me." She shuffled closer to the wall; the blanket rippled with her movement. Her breath came slightly faster from the exertion, but she did not evince signs of true pain. Her head tipped toward him. "S'plenty of room."

There was, indeed, room enough to lie on his side. And her injured right side lay nearest the wall; it was reasonably shielded from any stray movement of his. Continued rejection would only serve to distress her.

He bent over to remove his shoes. He had stored his nightclothes, along with the rest of his things, in his own sleeping suite. His bags held nothing that could not be discarded in an instant if such become necessary. And proper sleep attire mattered little at the moment, he supposed, as he would not be sleeping.

Even had he not been concerned with her health, he would have remained awake simply to enjoy her nearness. Every moment with her had been savored and stored, set aside in the room dedicated solely to her in his mind. For now, at least, such moments had been few enough that he could not conceive of letting a single one pass.

Shoes lined up neatly at the end of the bed, he turned and lay on his right side atop the covers, head propped on his right hand. With his left, he found hers and stroked his thumb over her wrist.

"Does this suit, Clarice?"

She grinned at him, though her eyes hardly opened.

"It'll do, I s'pose. I've got you next to me, an' I won the argument."

He smiled as well, though she was unlikely to notice in her current state.

"You'll make life quite interesting if you insist on winning every argument, Clarice."

"Not _every_ one," she mumbled. "Jus' the important ones."

He began humming quietly, a lullaby encouraging her to surrender to the exhaustion evident on her face. His fingers massaged her own, improving the blood flow, stimulating the healing process that robbed her of energy for other tasks.

The humming took on more form, half-remembered words slipping out, a mix of Lithuanian and Italian, his mind distantly noted. His focus remained on more important matters – the slowing of Clarice's pulse, the evenness of her breaths. She would be asleep soon. He was, therefore, unprepared when she spoke.

"S'nice." Her voice was almost inaudible. He bent his head closer and felt the warmth of her exhalation against his cheek. "…sang her to sleep, too."

She was halfway to dreamland, he expected; it was no wonder that her thoughts made little sense.

He paused in his singing. "Her?"

Clarice's head nodded drowsily on the pillow.

"Your sister. S'OK if you're thinking of her. Must've hurt to lose her."

Icy pain poured through him. How had she known?

He wanted very much to ask her, to demand she explain herself. But she needed her rest, and it seemed she had found it. She did not speak again.

Eventually, he laid his head down beside hers, pressing in closely to share the same pillow, the rush of blood through her temple a symphony against his forehead, and contemplated the workings of her mind. Were it possible to gain such knowledge through osmosis, surely he would find it now. For all that she believed in justice, her intuition felt to him like a kind of grace.

The thoughts kept him occupied for hours. In importance, certainly, there had been no equal to Mischa in his mind until Clarice. That she had somehow sensed the truth – though he had mentioned Mischa in her presence only once, as he recalled, and not mentioned her death at all, and though he himself had resisted the knowledge, perhaps attempting to deny that anyone might occupy such hallowed ground in his thoughts – and that she _accepted_, without question, that his affection for her might also contain no small amount of transference, for when he looked into her eyes he saw that same deep well of purity and trust gazing back at him….

Mischa's innocent trust in him had been that of a child, and he had failed that trust. And yet Clarice, who understood his nature, who perhaps even _appreciated_ his nature – her trust in him was equally deep and unsparing. He had not predicted that he might find that trust again in his lifetime, that he would have the opportunity to be worthy of it.

Had he been capable of it, Hannibal Lecter might, in that moment, have believed in the existence of a merciful god.

He roused himself from his contemplation just after four in the morning. Though Clarice still slept, deeply, undisturbed by her injuries or his nearness, it was time to wake her, if only briefly. Her painkillers would be most effective when taken steadily rather than waiting for the emergence of new pain.

He rose from the bed to retrieve the Percocet and bottled water before returning to seat himself at her side. He might simply call her name or lay a firm hand to her shoulder, he admitted; either would be sufficient to wake her. But he found his fingers reaching for her face instead, one hand caressing her cheek in a repetitive, circular motion as he whispered her name. A gentle awakening would allow her to slip back into sleep more easily, true, but it was not for that reason that he chose to act as he did.

No, his reasons were entirely selfish – feeling the pure enjoyment of her soft skin under his fingers and watching the open affection on her face as she slowly came to an awareness of his presence. In that unguarded moment between sleep and waking, as her eyelids lifted, he saw the infinite depths in which even he might find peace.


	14. Chapter 14

Although Clarice woke in near darkness, it was not the sort of gasping, shaking, scream-echoing awakening with which she was familiar. The only sound in her ears was her name, a softly insistent tone at the edge of her awareness. She felt warm, and comforted, as her eyes adjusted. The doctor's hand lay on her cheek; his body leaned over her, silhouetted – the light from the bathroom was on, she realized, the door partly closed. Of him, she could see only a pair of glowing eyes.

"S'time to get up?"

"Just for a moment, Clarice." His hand moved from her face to her shoulder, his arm slipping underneath and curling around her back. He lifted her, slowly. "You're due for more pharmaceutical assistance, my dear."

She blinked at him, not quite comprehending until his free hand pressed a tablet into hers. She took it without question, allowing him to hold the water bottle for her to sip.

He lowered her back to the pillow afterward, tucking the sheets around her once more. His hand returned to her cheek. She fell asleep to the feel of his fingers tracing across her skin.

When she woke again, a light rain tapped against the window. The doctor sat at the edge of the bed, fully dressed in fresh clothes. Jealousy shot through her. He'd obviously showered and changed while she slept.

"Good morning, Clarice. We have just under three hours before our arrival in Washington, if you'd care to rise and prepare for the day."

"I'm taking a shower." That was nonnegotiable, she thought. The last time she had really showered had been Thursday morning, before eating breakfast and getting into an SUV with two walking dead men. "I'm not getting into clean clothes again while I'm still all… gross."

"Certainly, Clarice, you may shower if you wish."

Having expected a fight, she eyed him with suspicion.

"No argument, Doctor?"

"You are determined to shower today, are you not?"

"Yeah…."

"If you do not do so here, you will attempt to do so when you arrive home?"

"Absolutely. First thing."

"The shower here is equipped with a bench seat and assistive railings. Yours is not. Even allowing for the movement of the train, you will be safer and more comfortable showering here. And your safety and comfort are my primary concerns at the moment, Clarice."

"You knew I'd want a shower. That's why you booked this room."

"Were our situations reversed, Clarice, I would wish to shower. I merely anticipated that you would wish the same."

"Alright, smart guy. What are the conditions? I know you have some."

He smiled at her, a true smile, and she felt the hard line of her lips soften in return.

"An astute observation. Yes, there are conditions. If you feel you cannot abide by them, I'm afraid a shower will be out of the question."

She raised an eyebrow. _Yeah, like that's happening._

"Lay 'em on me."

"You will remain seated; I won't have you slipping and falling. You will refrain from leaning far forward or bending over; you'll strain your abdominal muscles if you attempt it, and it's quite possible that the muscles will not respond to such commands at all yet. The water will be tepid, not hot; combined with your pain medication, too much heat is likely to make you feel faint. You will call out for me immediately if a problem arises – and if you don't call out and I in any way sense that you are having trouble, Clarice, I will open that door and assist you despite any protests you see fit to make."

He wasn't smiling now, and neither was she. They were… fair… conditions, she admitted. Reasonable, even. And after days of nothing but a damp washcloth, she desperately wanted a real shower.

_So just don't do anything to embarrass yourself or push your body too hard, and he won't get his first real eyeful of your naked self while you're all bruised and stitched and funky._

_Yeah, we'll save that until you're just scarred._

Great. Now she felt angry _and_ depressed.

"Fine. Warm shower, sitting down, no contortionist tricks, call if I need you. I got it."

He said nothing about her tone, which even she knew was petulant. He merely helped her stand, provided stability at her side as she shuffled over to the bathroom with baby steps, and helped seat her in the shower stall. He set a small caddy of toiletries beside her and placed a towel within easy reach.

"I expect you'll insist upon removing the nightclothes by yourself, Clarice, but I am available to assist."

"You're right." She gave him a wry smile, the best she could manage. "I'm gonna insist you leave now."

"A moment, Clarice." He stepped out into the main compartment and returned with a handful of clean clothes, which he set on the dry sink basin. "Much as I'd enjoy seeing you emerge clad in a towel, I doubt it's quite what you had in mind."

She huffed a laugh, grimaced at the pain, and resisted the urge to clutch her side.

"I'm a riot of colors, Doctor. Black, purple, red, green – not the sort of thing anyone wants to see in a towel."

"Mmm." He disagreed, obviously, but he made no further comment on the subject. "Can you reach the shower controls easily from the seat, Clarice? Is the showerhead adjusted to your liking?"

She reached for the controls and found them well within her grasp. Likewise, the showerhead was angled toward the bench seat.

"I'm good, yeah."

"I'll leave you to it, then. Do try to keep the sutures covered, Clarice. We can redress them as needed after your shower." He turned to go.

"Doctor?"

He paused at the threshold.

"Thanks. For, um… just, thanks."

"You're welcome, Clarice." His tone was soft, as was the click of the door as he stepped out and closed it behind himself.

Her shower was a long one – out of necessity rather than enjoyment. The motion of her right arm was restricted by pain; she could neither raise nor extend it without feeling the sharp twang that set her teeth on edge. So her non-dominant hand was pressed into service. With the pain medication giving everything a fuzzy haze and her left arm unused to the exertion, she found her shower became a series of short bursts of motion followed by longer pauses to rest and regroup. Washing her hair one-handed, without bending over, came close to making shaving her head an attractive proposition.

Between the clumsiness and exhaustion, it wasn't surprising when she knocked over the shower caddy as she twisted to turn off the water. It clattered to the floor. _Shit._

"I'm fine, Doctor," she called through the door before he could ask. "You better not be hovering out there. I can handle things just fine on my own."

His response, when it came, was more modulated than her own; it seemed he stood just beyond the door.

"Of course you can, Clarice. I expect you're quite accustomed to doing so. But you might consider that there are other options open to you."

She glanced down at the bruising splashed across her torso as she peeled off the wet bandage protecting her stitches. They crawled like angry black ants up her side. Did she want his help? Did she want him to see her- _unless he already has. _Suspicion climbed up her spine.

"Why did you come to the hospital, Doctor?"

"To see you, of course, Clarice. To assist you, if I could."

"To see my injuries for yourself, you mean."

"Yes."

There was no hesitation in his answer, though surely he must have suspected it would anger her. She closed her eyes. Anger, yes. Defeat, yes. Frustration at her own lack of control over her life, yes. She tipped her head back against the shower wall and let the feelings wash through her. Why had he done that? _Because he loves me. Because knowing was better than not knowing. _

She sighed, swallowing back the angry response that had been lying on her tongue. He must have heard the sound.

"Only in my capacity as a medical professional, Clarice. Not as a prospective lover."

"You didn't... you haven't..."

"I limited my examination to your injuries." His matter-of-fact tone softened, and she wished she could see his face, even were it no easier to read than the door it lay behind. "Nothing has been spoiled, Clarice."

Of course he recognized her fears. She was being childish and stubborn, she knew, but she didn't want his first real impression marred by torn and bruised flesh. She wanted something... special. Memorable.

"I don't think I'm ready for another option yet, Doctor. Let me do what I can on my own first, OK?"

"Certainly, my dear. I'm here if you need me."

_I do need you. I need you to look at me with desire and find me beautiful instead of damaged. And that's not going to happen today._

* * *

><p>The morning had been something of a trial from the moment Clarice woke. Her frustration and uncertainty were not unexpected, certainly, and her stubbornness could be most enjoyable in appropriate contexts. But there were some areas in which she did not yet feel comfortable relying upon him.<p>

He did not take such rejection personally; quite the opposite. That she felt the need to impose some distance indicated a desire for modesty, an awareness of her own sexuality in his presence. He did not, therefore, call her attention to his heightened sense of her, to the fact that although he could not see her in the shower, he could quite easily construct a mental picture based upon the information his other senses gathered.

The rustle and slosh of the washcloth as it moved over her skin. The pained inhalations as she pressed too hard on bruises she could not see. The increased scent of almonds as she opened the shampoo. The soft swearing, the alteration in the patterned sound of the water strikes as she shifted, undoubtedly struggling, to wash her hair. Perhaps, in years to come, he might join her and assist with such tasks even when such assistance was not required.

For now, however, he would answer her honestly, neutrally, with an eye toward easing her concerns. And when she fell silent, he waited, with customary patience. She had clearly discovered the clean bandages and medical tape he had left with her clothes; he had, it seemed, correctly anticipated her desire to accomplish the redressing herself.

More rustling. Tape tearing. Sharp breaths. Shuffling steps. The snap of fabric shaken out. Fingernails clicking against buttons. Silence, and then more swearing.

He allowed a smile, amused by her dogged determination, wondering precisely what it would require, how long she would continue to exhaust her slim resources, before she would—

The door opened.

"Dr. Lecter?"

He let the smile slip away, returning to a neutral expression, before he turned.

"Yes, Clarice?"

She sighed.

"Would you… comb my hair out for me? I can't raise my right arm to do it, and my left is on strike at the moment."

"Of course, Clarice. Perhaps you'd care to sit down?" He had converted the bed back into its daytime seating configuration while she bathed.

"Yeah. That would be good." Her face appeared pale despite the warmth of her shower. Perhaps ninety minutes had elapsed since he had closed the door and left her to it; she was, quite obviously, at the limit of her energy. It was nearing ten o'clock, and she was due for another Percocet and an antibiotic. They would be arriving at Union Station in little more than an hour.

He helped settle her sideways in the seat and proffered the pills, with water, before retrieving a towel and the comb and seating himself behind her. She relaxed a bit as he carefully patted her hair dry with the towel before attacking the problem. He worked slowly, steadily, starting near the ends, pressing his free hand to her scalp to eliminate unnecessary tugging as he worked through the tangles.

She made soft sounds of contentment, clearly pleased with his patient attention. He sought to maximize her enjoyment, rapidly assessing the possibilities for doing so, finally settling on an activity he knew she had appreciated in the past, though he was not accustomed to being so… open.

"It has been many, many years since I've done this, Clarice. I find it is much easier when one is fully grown."

A pause, in which he expected she was searching her memory, hampered by the pain relievers entering her bloodstream.

"Your mother's hair."

"Indeed. My hands were smaller then, my reach shorter, as one might expect. The process undoubtedly took longer than if she had completed it herself."

She chuckled, quietly.

"I'll bet that didn't matter to her, when she got to spend that time with her son."

"Mmm. No, I don't believe it did. The process took as long as it took, and our time together was uninterrupted. Even now, I find the action is… quite soothing."

He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear; she leaned sideways into his touch.

"For me, too," she admitted.

He continued combing through her hair long after such action had ceased to be needful, waiting for the inevitable result as her exhaustion and the Percocet did their work. She yawned. Her body began to sway slightly with his motion. He laid the comb on the seat behind him and used his fingers instead, massaging her scalp and neck with slow movements.

She startled, once, her body's last effort to stumble away from slumber.

"All right, Clarice?" He kept his voice low, a soft hum beside her ear.

"M'sleepy."

"That's fine, Clarice. We've time yet."

"You won't... you'll still... be here?"

He closed his eyes briefly, the better to savor the open plea in her voice. The fear of abandonment ran deep in Clarice Starling, but it was not something he expected she allowed others to see – and certainly not something she allowed _herself_ to experience again, keeping others at arm's length precisely for that reason. But him – him, she wanted. For him, she allowed for the possibility of that pain in her life.

"I will," he confirmed. "Sleep, Clarice. I won't leave you alone."

He laid a gentle pressure on her shoulder, and she followed, the gap he had maintained between their bodies for politeness' sake erased as he supported her back with his chest and her head tipped against his shoulder. Her breaths whispered against his neck.

True to his word, he sat unmoving for the better part of an hour. Her trust was a precious thing – and the opportunity to hold her so closely would not come again for several weeks, he expected, if it came at all.

He could not banish the lingering sense that although she _could_ choose him, although she _wanted_ to do so, somehow… she _would_ not. That she would slip back into the lifelong habits that left her unfulfilled and alone – the habits that, in turn, left him adrift.

So it was neither surprise nor accident when his arms slipped around her, holding her loosely to avoid aggravating her injuries. And he did not delude himself into believing it was merely to stabilize her against the rocking of the train.

He felt the rhythm of her every breath, not only in the exhalations against his neck but also in the shifting of her ribcage against his own, and he wished, quite fancifully, that each breath would simply press her _into_ him until they merged into a single, inseparable existence. He might quell all doubt then, he supposed.

It was not until the train rocked to a halt at the station that he roused her. When she was sufficiently awake, he rose and retrieved the wheelchair from its stored position, unfolding it briskly. Her glare – at the chair, not him – was charmingly determined.

"Would you care to stretch your legs first, Clarice?"

"I'd _care_ to walk home my damn self," she muttered, though there was little heat behind her words.

He helped her stand, leaning in toward her ear.

"Ten steps, Clarice, hmm?"

She huffed a laugh, nodding. "Ten steps."

He watched with assessing eyes as she paced the small compartment; it was small enough that she needed turn at the window and pace back to accomplish ten steps, but she smiled as she did so. Her gait was unnaturally shortened, he noted, and her right foot barely cleared the thin carpet when she raised it to step forward. The motion undoubtedly pulled at her painfully.

"Better, Clarice?"

"Better," she agreed, though he could hear the slight tension in her voice and the uptick in her breathing. "But hell if I know what I'm gonna do at home all day by myself."

"Not to worry; you'll be well cared for." He paused as he helped seat her in the wheelchair for disembarking. "Ms. Mapp will be meeting you at the station."

"What? Ardelia's gonna be _here_? But you — she can't see you, she'll—"

"Calm yourself, Clarice. Ms. Mapp will not see me."

She took a breath; he could see her running the scenario in her head.

"Right. You would have thought of that. Sorry. I'm just…."

"Off balance? It's to be expected, my dear. You've had a recent trauma and you're heavily medicated. Some allowances are not unwarranted."

_And you've granted me allowances in return, Clarice. I had not anticipated having the opportunity to rest beside you throughout the night, nor to cradle you in my arms this morning. _

A knock on the compartment door had him suppressing a flash of irritation. He would have preferred more time – and he suspected, from the crestfallen look on her face, that she would have preferred it as well. But as he could not escort her himself, he had engaged a porter to do so.

"A moment, please," he called. He gathered Clarice's bags and laid them gently in her lap. Her hands clasped his wrists, drawing him in; curious, he allowed it. He did not expect she would kiss him, and she did not. But she raised one hand to his hair, urging him closer, until her cheek lay alongside his. And then she was still. It was not quite a hug, he thought, perplexed, and then he realized. She was breathing deeply, an action that surely pained her. She was… inhaling his scent.

The knock came again. She let her hands fall. Her face turned away from his.

"Soon, Clarice," he murmured.

And then he answered the door, reiterating his instructions to the young man waiting outside, watching as he carefully maneuvered Clarice into the hall and away from him.

The doctor quickly gathered his own things from the neighboring compartment, donned his coat and hat, and exited the car from the opposite end. The porter's uniform made the young man easy to spot despite the crowd.

Ms. Mapp was easily noted as well – from her shriek, if not from her arm frantically waving.

"Ohmigod, Cee!" She rushed forward, perhaps twenty-five feet to his right, and embraced Clarice, whose posture instantly stiffened before she relaxed and allowed the greeting. Clarice's head turned; her expression appeared lost. He watched as she mastered it and forced a smile for her friend. Her voice did not carry, and he was unable to read her lips as she turned back. Ms. Mapp, however, was quite vocal as they moved out of the station.

"You should have let me come out and get you! I can't believe you came all this way by yourself. It must have been a nightmare."

He waited, his eyes on Clarice, as she lowered herself painfully into Ms. Mapp's vehicle. The more time he spent with her, the more time he _needed_ to spend with her. The more difficult it became to see her leave. The more quickly he could not resist the urge to see her again.

Clarice Starling was an addiction. His blood – his _soul_, something he'd thought dead – reached out for her, even in her absence. For the first time since that long-ago winter, he remembered what it was to love desperately, unreservedly, with his whole heart.

And when she had gone, she left something of herself within him. Some piece of her own soul, perhaps, that longed to be reunited with its owner. As though the physical laws of the universe themselves demanded it.

It was the only reasonable explanation for the ache in his chest.


	15. Chapter 15

The doorbell woke her from her doze. Clarice rolled her head left, checking the nightstand clock. Thursday. 10 a.m. Yesterday at this time, the doctor had been combing her hair. She brushed the thought aside.

Two hours had passed since Ardelia had left for work, promising to call and check up on her throughout the day. Had she slept through the phone? Had Dee called a neighbor to make sure she was OK?

Sitting up was a chore. Clarice struggled not to pant; long, slow breaths were better. They didn't set off a chain reaction of muscle twitches that sent her abdomen into agonizing spasms. She expected to hear the doorbell again by the time she got her feet on the floor and used her arms to lever herself upright, but there was only silence.

_I swear to god, if I get to the damn door and whoever it is has already left, I'm going to chase them down and beat them bloody._

Well, that was unlikely, given the short stride she was forced into using if she didn't want to aggravate her side. And she definitely didn't want to do that; she had hours yet before she could even think about taking another pain pill.

Despite her nap – which had followed a full night's sleep – walking across the living room and into the hall to reach the front door was exhausting enough that she planned to go right back to bed once she'd reassured whatever neighbor Ardelia had panicked on her behalf.

The bell finally rang again when she reached the hallway. Clarice took a deep breath to shout and winced instead, her hand instinctively reaching to press against her side.

_Shit. Shitshitshit._

"Won't be doing _that_ again," she muttered, leaning her left side on the door frame and flipping the lock. She pulled the door open, surprise rippling through her at the open, friendly face before her. The doctor's voice echoed in her head. _Not to worry, Clarice; you'll be well cared for._

She smiled softly at her visitor.

"Hey, Barney."

"Hi, Clarice."

She scanned him from head to foot, noting the private care logo on his shirt and the matching duffel bag in his hand.

"I'm pretty sure my insurance doesn't cover a home health aide, Barney."

"Your benefactor seems to think it does," he answered. "If you wanna send me away, I'll understand, but I don't think he will."

She pushed the door further open in answer.

"He'd just find another way around any stubborn objections I make," she agreed. "So this what you're doing now?"

He stepped inside and closed the door behind himself.

"Yeah, after the rehab for my leg – you heard about the accident, right? Anyway, I thought I'd work with people going through similar stuff. They're usually less violent than the patients in my last job. Personalities are just as abrasive, though." He cast a sidelong glance at her, setting the duffel on the floor. "You gonna let me help you back to wherever you're nesting so you can lie down, or are we gonna argue about it first?"

"Is it gonna make a difference if I argue?"

"Nope."

"Then I won't bother. I'm a little short of breath these days."

"I s'pose they told you that was gonna be the case for a while?" She nodded.

"Good. The more you listen, the faster all that pain and soreness will go away. And I expect that'll make someone real happy."

She wondered, then, just what the doctor had told him about them. _He's hardly one to tell tales. But Barney knows us both as well as anyone… and he's seen us interact. He'd probably suspect the truth of it without any help._

"Yeah, me," she quipped. "It's gonna be weeks before I can get back to my running regimen."

"Uh-huh. Right." Barney stepped up to her side and slipped his arm around her, his hand coming to rest on her right hip, below her injury. "C'mon, let's get you into bed."

"You work fast, Barney."

He snorted.

"I think I know which way the wind blows, Clarice. Whether you do or not – and I expect you do – I'd swear on a stack of Bibles that my intentions are entirely professional."

So he knew. She felt no panic at the thought, no instinctive, desperate need to explain herself, no self-conscious questioning of whether she was still a good person and how she could possibly love a man like Hannibal Lecter. She felt only the warmth of that love and the reflected warmth of the doctor's love, shown in his sending Barney to her when he could not come himself.

She took a tentative step toward her door; it was easier, she admitted, with Barney's supportive arm and solid body to hold her up.

"You tell _him_ that, too?"

"Haven't seen him," he answered, his attention focused on her feet as she moved. "Just found a note and your medical file in an envelope left in my car overnight and got the official reassignment this morning."

"Ah. Sorry for the disruption, Barney. I hope you know you don't have to—"

"You're being stubborn. Silly, too." He paused his steps when she did, letting her catch her breath, until finally they reached her bedside. He swept the covers further back before turning to face her. "Use my forearms for balance; it'll keep the weight on your arms and shoulders instead of your abdominal muscles."

Clarice nodded, already dreading the movements that would take her from standing to lying down. But the painful stretching wasn't nearly so bad with Barney's assistance; once she sat down, he placed one arm behind her back, supporting her weight, while his other arm lifted her legs to the bed and swiveled her into position so he could lower her gently to the pillow. He pulled the covers up without being asked.

She breathed slowly, as deeply as she comfortably could, waiting for the ache to subside. It was better by far than the sharp pain she got trying the maneuver herself.

Barney was examining the collection of bottles on her nightstand.

"When did you take your last Percocet?"

"Eight. I'm not due for another until two." Her eyelids didn't want to stay open. Answering the door had wiped her out. "You staying?"

"Until four. I'm supposed to be out before your roommate gets home. Take a nap. I'll wake you for your pain pill and lunch."

"K. Barney?"

"Yeah, Clarice?"

"Thanks."

* * *

><p>Clarice's neighborhood had not changed significantly since Hannibal Lecter's brief nocturnal visit thirteen months prior. He had taken a different route today as a precaution, though he did not expect to encounter difficulty in this task. His car did not slow, did not call attention to his interest in one particular two-story home in the middle of the block.<p>

A tight rein on his thoughts prevented him from musing overmuch on Clarice's current disposition; as it was early afternoon, she was likely to be having lunch or napping. And if all had gone according to plan – ah, yes, there was Barney's vehicle, an older-model Chevrolet Cavalier, its bright blue exterior making it easy to spot in passing. She was well cared for, then, and he need not worry that stubbornness or upset over his presumption in arranging for her care had caused her to reject that care.

Barney's presence would help the doctor reinforce his connection with her during her convalescence. He knew Barney to be kind and tough as well as discreet. And Barney had cared for him during his imprisonment; how appropriate that he would care for Clarice during hers - both the physical imprisonment imposed by the limitations of her body as it recovered and the emotional imprisonment of presenting a false face to the world as she extricated herself from what had once been her most sought-after dream, her defining drive.

Her acceptance of Barney's care, and by extension his own, of course, meant he had duties to carry out for the remainder of the day.

He made several stops to obtain various foodstuffs. Clarice would require soft meals to simplify digestion for several days yet, but she would also need additional protein to speed wound closure. Eggs, fish, and chicken would be his primary ingredients; quiche, strata, and soup would suffice as proper mediums for their delivery. As apples were in season and orchards plentiful in the area, he gathered sufficient stock to provide sweet desserts, recalling her pleasure in the addition of blackberry compote to uninspired oatmeal.

The sun had set by the time the doctor returned to his current dwelling, an executive suite designed for travelers with extended business in the area. The atmosphere was quietly professional, which suited his needs, and although the décor was pedestrian, the suite included the full kitchen necessary for seeing to Clarice's needs as well.

He paused for his own dinner before beginning preparations for his patient's meals. She would require variety, he expected, or the food would simply linger, uneaten, while her recovery suffered. As tomorrow would be Friday, and Barney would not be making weekend visits, leaving Clarice to Ms. Mapp's well-intentioned care, he would need to supply nine meals to carry her through Monday morning.

The hours before dawn found Hannibal Lecter slipping a jimmy into the passenger-side door of a familiar blue Chevrolet Cavalier before depositing a cooler filled with nine sectioned and labeled containers, reheating instructions attached, surrounded by frozen ice packs. In the top of the cooler, enclosed in a plastic bag to protect the contents against any leakage, he placed two sealed envelopes. The outer envelope read simply "Barney" in plain block text. A sheet of additional suggestions lay inside, as did a smaller envelope bearing the name _Clarice_ in formal, flowing copperplate.

His work completed, the doctor slid into bed as sunlight began to filter through the overcast sky. The weather outside had no effect on his travels; in his mind, he had already crossed a marble hall to the room where his Starling waited to greet him.

* * *

><p>Clarice lingered in the half-dreaming haze between sleep and waking for longer than was her habit. In her dream, she ran through a meadow of tall grass gone to seed, the soft tips rustling with her motion, tickling her legs as she passed by. Her pace was easy, her stride long and fluid. And though she could not see him, every instinct told her Hannibal Lecter's eyes watched her with a hunger that made her shiver.<p>

And then he pounced.

They tumbled down together, rolling as one, the grass flattening out beneath them as he playfully pinned her under his weight. His mouth lowered to hers. She arched her back to increase their contact—

_Ah, fuck! Sonovabitch!_

Her eyes flew open, tears leaking from the corners and sliding toward her temples without her permission. Her back throbbed, a beating drum that washed pain outward in unceasing ripples. A whimper escaped before she could force it down. She focused on her breathing, on making it steady and even, as she stared at the ceiling above her bed.

"Clarice?" Barney, entering the bedroom. Of course he couldn't have been in the kitchen, out of earshot. "What happened?"

She took another three breaths before answering.

"Just moved wrong is all." Beneath the sheets, her left hand dug into the mattress as the waves of pain began to ebb. "Not really any _right_ moves about now, anyway."

"Nope," Barney agreed, more cheerful about it than she had been. "But holding still won't do your muscles any favors, either, so I s'pose you just can't win."

"That's great, Barney. You work on that bedside manner in the mirror?"

"Every morning." His eyebrows lifted slightly. "Hold that thought – got something for you."

He left the room, briefly, and returned waving something in his right hand.

"I'm gonna get lunch heated up – it's a salmon and egg thing, and don't gimme that look – and then we'll see about removing your stitches after you take your next Percocet. You're eight days post-op now, so we should be good to go. Don't worry, I'm certified."

"I'm not worried." She wasn't, truly, because she was only half-listening to Barney's chatter. What she really wanted was that thing he was holding, that thing that looked like an envelope with her name on it, that thing with her name in _very_ familiar handwriting.

"Uh-huh. I can see that. I guess you're wanting this, then?" He laid the envelope in her hand. "I'll leave you to your reading while I fix lunch."

"Thanks, Barney."

She had the self-control to wait until he'd left before opening the envelope.

**Dearest Clarice,**

**Thank you.**

**I'm well aware of your penchant for stubborn independence, my dear. Thus I am profoundly grateful that you have set such thoughts aside in your convalescence and allowed me – via proxy – to attend to your needs. **

**Is it wishful thinking on my part to believe you do so that your recovery might be speedy and we more swiftly joined? Perhaps it is merely frustration at your current limitations; you thrive no better than I in confinement, my dear. I do not doubt, however, that you have chosen the wiser course of action here.**

**Our separation, though painful, will be short-lived, and our resulting freedom all the sweeter for it. You will have difficult days ahead, I know, full of falsity.**

**Do not doubt yourself, Clarice. Only you may say what is best for you. Only your judgment matters here.**

**With deepest love and affection,**

**Hannibal**

Reassurance. Understanding. Support. She was not alone; he was with her.

She allowed her hand to lower to her chest, still gripping the letter; the air stirred as it moved, bringing the scent of his aftershave to her nose. Spicy. Masculine. A scent that made her wish her dream had not been interrupted.

But she refolded the letter and set such thoughts aside as Barney returned, tapping gently on the door.

"Lunch is served." He put the tray down on the floor to help her sit up first, piling the pillows behind her back and easing her onto them with practiced motions. "Good?"

"Good."

He settled the tray across her lap. The salmon-and-egg thing was some kind of custard-like pie – and although it was soft and practically fell apart on her tongue, it didn't taste half bad. And there was applesauce for dessert.

After she'd finished eating, taken her pills, and made a brief trip to the bathroom, Clarice lay flat on her bed, pajama top raised to reveal the stitches running up the right side of her stomach. There were others on her back, stitches where the knife had exited and where some of the glass shards had struck deep in her flesh. They would come next.

Barney's large hands prodded at the healing wound before he pronounced it fit enough to remove the stitches – no discoloration beyond the now purple-green bruises, no swelling, no seepage. Despite the wide expanse of her naked flesh on display, despite the unattractive bruising, she felt no embarrassment as he cleaned the area with an alcohol pad and set to work with scissors and tweezers.

There was no tension between them – no anticipation. Seeing her body was just a matter of course for Barney. Professional.

_But the doctor said it was professional for him, too. _She chased after the thought that followed, not willing to let it slip away. _For him. Not for me. That's why it's different. _She had no expectations here, no emotions attached to letting Barney snip the threads and pull the stitches from her mottled skin. _But how can the doctor – how can Hannibal - look and not feel? Is it really that easy for him to keep things separate? To see me as a patient and not the woman he loves?_

Unsure whether to be pleased or discomfited by the extent of the doctor's emotional compartmentalization, Clarice was silent as Barney pulled twenty-three tiny loops of thread from her skin. The thoughts still chased round and round in her head after he had finished, following her into sleep and unpleasantly coloring her dreams.

_It's only love, Clarice. Did you truly believe me capable of it?_

* * *

><p>The fickle, enthusiastic notes of Variation 1 gave way to the slightly more sedate – though still jaunty – Variation 2 as Hannibal Lecter lowered the heat beneath the boiling milk and chicken broth and added flour to thicken the mixture. When complete, the base would be appropriate for any number of variations upon cream soup, a staple of Clarice's recovery diet.<p>

He felt young and in love with his muse – a perfect complement for Gould's '55 recording, quick and light, his fingers dancing. The doctor hummed along or paused in silence as his nature dictated in each moment, a bit of whimsical joy in his sense of purpose.

Although his love tethered him unalterably to Clarice Starling, he rejoiced in the freedom it brought him. In serving her needs, he found within himself a previously unknown depth of contentment. Plans for their life together, both short- and long-term, occupied his thoughts.

Preparing her meals each day gave him structure and an outlet for non-contemplative needs – steady work to occupy his hands. He was… busy. Pleasantly so.

Though he could not, at the moment, _see _her, he found satisfaction in providing for her. Anticipating her needs. Supplying Barney with the appropriate materials to keep her from sliding into depression or forcing her body beyond its current limitations.

She was not, he knew, a woman who reveled in inactivity. The imposition of it, along with what she might consider the betrayal of her own body – a weakness - would tax her physically and emotionally. Thus he would nourish her as best as he was able from a distance.

Was it possible she felt it? That this love between them linked them on a quantum level, an indivisible truth? Could he, with the strength of his love, _pull_ her to him? Strengthen her own affection for him in return?

His love for her was a certainty. A newly cemented first principle supplanting all others. She would come to understand in time, if she had not already.

"This separation is but a brief trial, Clarice." He spoke to himself, to her image in his mind, in the silence as the CD concluded. "We must remain focused on the promise of the future, hmm?"


	16. Chapter 16

It was two weeks before they let her leave the house, and by then she was going stir crazy.

Ardelia had offered – multiple times – to take personal days to stay home with her during the week if she didn't like her home health aide, but her roommate's overly solicitous behavior in the evenings and on the weekends was more than enough. She didn't need that kind of mothering all day, too.

And it wasn't as though she could dump her frustration on Dee; that wasn't fair, and it would have hurt her feelings. Not like the doctor. He would have given her a target for her anger and not taken her lashing out personally. No, he would have deliberately provoked her, she thought, goaded her until she had unloaded every shred of pain and rage and futility… and then he would have asked her, point blank, whether she felt as though she could act with some civility and decorum.

It was Barney who kept her sane in the first two weeks, bullying her into taking her pain pills, making sure she didn't overexert herself, steadying her when her steps faltered, bringing her balanced meals and music and books and insisting that she take proper care of herself. She wondered if he provided the doctor with daily reports on her condition, too, but she never asked.

His private business was his, after all, just as hers was hers. He didn't ask questions. For that, she was grateful.

It was Barney who drove her to her follow-up appointment and Barney who paused with her in the parking lot on the way out as she struggled not to turn her head and stare when she glimpsed a man watching her from the other end of the lot. He was ostensibly loading something in his car trunk, but she knew that form, knew those graceful movements, and she was overcome with pain at the knowledge that he was so near and yet… not.

After the first unwise gasp, she was able to calm her breathing with focused, deliberate attentiveness. She watched the doctor in her peripheral vision as she pushed back her pain. The doubts of her nightmares, her frustrations and fears, faded as she watched him.

Compartmentalization didn't mean the emotion wasn't _present_ – it didn't mean he didn't feel pain at their separation; hadn't he said so in his letter, that this time apart would be painful for them both? – no, it was nothing more than the way she pushed aside her physical pain now, so that she might feel close to him. He had been able to push aside his love for her because she needed medical care, and her health was important to him. But underneath that rational action beat the heart of the man who loved her. And she could not go to him now. _Not yet._

Barney waited patiently at her side. Her fingers had tightened around his arm; she loosened them as soon as she noticed, though he had made no mention of the discomfort it likely caused him. When she had regained her composure and tilted her head up toward his, he spoke softly.

"OK, Clarice?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm good now."

If he heard the lie in her voice, he didn't call her on it. They just continued their baby-step shuffle toward the car, where he opened her door and helped lower her into the seat, pulling the seat belt far enough forward for her to easily grasp and click it before he closed the door after her.

She couldn't see the doctor's car anymore; the parking lot was too full and her position too low. She slumped in the seat, winced at the pain, and sharply reminded herself to stop feeling so goddamn sorry for herself.

_You chose this. You could've done things differently, and you didn't. Suck it up, Starling. _

"So," she said, brightly, as Barney got in and started the engine, "stop for cheeseburgers and fries on the way home?"

He laughed.

"Sorry, not on the approved menu. There's a rice soup in the fridge with your name on it."

"You know I can eat solid foods, right?" She pulled a folded sheaf of papers from her coat pocket and waggled them invitingly. "I got a note an' everything."

He shrugged, glancing at her briefly before returning his eyes to the road.

"Complaints go to the chef, and that ain't me."

The papers stopped waving in midair. She'd known, of course, that the doctor had probably been guiding the choices for her diet. And for soft food, it hadn't been bland and tasteless. But she hadn't really considered what that might mean… that he might, daily, be preparing her meals. Thinking of her. Caring for her, as best he could, from a distance. _Loving_ her. She belatedly tucked the papers back into her pocket.

"Soup sounds good."

This time, there was no lie in her voice.

* * *

><p>He had not entirely accounted for the difficulty.<p>

It had been two weeks since he had left Clarice at the train station, and in that time he had not seen her in person.

Arranging to do so today had been a simple matter; each night, Barney conveniently… _forgot_… to take his binder inside. It lay on the passenger seat of his car with his notes on Clarice's schedule tucked within. Perusing such notations while he delivered Clarice's meals in the deep darkness of the pre-dawn hours had become a regular part of the doctor's routine.

Barney's brief notes served as his window into Clarice's mind.

…_Sleep disturbed. Not physical distress. Emotional?…_

The doctor had left classical music CDs with his delivery the next night – Brahms' _Lullaby_, a pointed suggestion, among other pieces he expected she would find familiar.

_...Forced inactivity is a stressor. Physical therapy options limited; patient tires easily, becomes frustrated with restrictions.…_

He had left a book the next night – a beginner's guide to Italian. The Latin roots, overlapping with her knowledge of French and Spanish, would make it an excellent place to begin her instruction. A bit of mental exercise would help divert her attention from the lack of physical stimulation, he expected, but it was a problem that would remain until she could resume her normal activity level. His Starling was not one for sitting still.

_...Post-surgical follow-up 10 a.m. tomorrow, office of Dr. Nicolas Millson. Patient is eager to leave the house for the first time in two weeks.…_

Thus, at half past ten on a Wednesday morning, Hannibal Lecter found himself cruising through the parking lot outside a medical office complex in northern Virginia, looking for Barney's automobile. It was easily found, parked in the second row near the front door. The doctor surveyed the lot for a suitable vantage point and parked his own vehicle a good distance away.

He exited after twenty minutes had passed, opening the trunk and idly shifting its contents as though searching for something. Perhaps fifteen minutes more went by before a familiar figure, hampered by an unfamiliar, stiff gait, exited the front door.

It was in that moment that he realized his error – the planning and execution had been so simplistic, not even rising to the level of intellectual challenge, that he had not fully considered his own emotional response to the sight of Clarice Starling.

Or, more to the point, to the sight of Clarice Starling taking short, tentative steps, holding her body rigidly straight in the unnatural manner familiar to anyone who had ever torn a muscle or broken a rib, grasping the arm of the man walking at her side.

Where he should have been.

There was no need for concern; Barney was not a threat to his relationship with Clarice. Barney was the man he had chosen to watch over her. Barney was a loyal, competent professional. But such knowledge did not dull the sharp pain in his chest. Jealousy. Envy. Yearning. By whatever name, it was the same emotion: the desire to be the man standing at her side.

She stopped with unexpected suddenness. Her head had turned not-quite in his direction. He, likewise, positioned himself as though his car trunk held thoroughly engrossing secrets, but in truth he watched her.

She wore a long winter coat that made it difficult to assess her condition, a familiar coat perhaps too heavy for the 50-degree weather, though he applauded its presence, and not only because he could easily call to mind the feel of it against his fingers as he tucked it around her for the first time at the hospital in Omaha. The less energy Clarice needed to expend maintaining an appropriate body temperature, the more resources her body could devote to knitting her organs and muscles back together.

Her stillness lasted minutes only, during which she never looked directly at him, never sought to meet his eyes. She understood the game; she would not call attention to his presence. And then the moment had passed. She exchanged words with Barney; she moved forward once more.

He watched approvingly while Barney handed her into the passenger seat as he would have done himself. His eyes did not stray until she had thoroughly gone from his sight. And when the car had left the lot, he moved on as well. He had other stops to make before he would return to his temporary accommodations to prepare Clarice's meals for the next day.

* * *

><p>Clarice absentmindedly stirred the soup reheating on the stovetop. It was Sunday dinner, the last one – the last of the doctor's prepared meals that Barney had left for her. They'd said their goodbyes Friday; she would be going back to the office tomorrow. No more home health aide. No more homecooked meals from the man who loved her.<p>

_Just for now. It's only temporary. If I think it often enough, it won't hurt so much, right?_

Ardelia's footsteps clattering down the stairs announced her arrival long before she entered the kitchen.

"Hey, roomie," she greeted Clarice, before ducking her head in the fridge. She closed the door without removing anything. "Shit, that sure looks empty without all of your little Tupperware things. That the last one?"

"Yeah. Potato cream soup."

"Cheeseburger and fries tomorrow, am I right?" Ardelia laughed. "I don't know how you lasted so long on that medical diet. I woulda put money on you rebelling a week ago. And those little cards with the reheating instructions for the weekend?"

She shuddered.

"It was like that time Lecter sent over all that catered food for you. I still can't believe you let me eat that."

"Yeah," Clarice said, hiding her smile. "The instruction notes this time were my idea. You know, to keep you from touching my Lecter-contaminated medically required food. It's supposed to be a secret, but…."

She glanced comically around the room and lowered her voice to a dramatic whisper.

"Hannibal Lecter is working as a chef for a home health care company right here in Virginia!"

Clarice almost couldn't hold her deadpan expression at the brief panic that flashed across Ardelia's face before she dissolved into laughter.

"Oh, god, that's hilarious, Cee. Can you _imagine_? Hannibal Lecter, under-chef in charge of potato soups. And his boss would be all, 'Mr. Lecter, I don't know how things were run where you _used_ to work, but here, _I'm _in charge. And we do not serve our patients $100 bottles of wine with their meals!'"

"Try $1,000."

"Are you shitting me?"

"Nope." Clarice turned off the stove and brought the pot right to the table. No point in dirtying a bowl when there was only enough to serve one person. "I did a lot of research back when I was interviewing him. The man has _seriously_ expensive taste."

"Seriously insane taste, you mean. Ugh. I don't know how you could stand talking to him for so long."

Clarice kept her gaze on her soup, blowing lightly across the loaded spoon. Inside, she was a mass of seething emotions. _You're going to badmouth him to my face while I'm eating soup he made for me because he cares? _

She swallowed the soup before replying.

"It was the job. I wanted to do it right. For that, I needed him."

"Better you than me, girlfriend."

_Amen to that, Dee. It's turning out better than I ever could have hoped._

The conversation was subdued after that, and Clarice begged off early, explaining that she wanted to be well-rested for her hearing with the committee overseeing the investigation into the Nebraska incident in the morning. Ardelia expressed unwavering, uncritical support; of course, Ardelia hadn't heard any of the details. Her support, her friendship, was blind.

It wasn't Ardelia's support that Clarice thought of the next morning as she waited for the committee to begin the questioning. It was Hannibal Lecter's piercing gaze, the eyes that _knew_ her so intimately and still loved her. The voice that demanded only that she remain true to her first principles.

So when the questions started flying, she spoke the truth. Without embellishment, without reference to her mental state during the incident or Dr. Lecter's voice in her head, but the truth nonetheless. How she had, in a fight for her life and the life of a child, resorted to the first weapons a child learns to use. Her teeth.

She would not apologize for that.

The men at the table shifted uncomfortably at times; some never even glanced at the crime scene photos in the packets in front of them, she noticed. Occasionally, one would look at her with something akin to revulsion, and she wondered if a parade of police officers and psychiatrists had looked at the doctor in the same manner. She had told the truth, as she preferred, and now when she opted to leave, citing psychological trauma, they would be happy to see the back of her.

Only Jack Crawford, far down the table, met her eyes – and from him, she thought she saw something like disappointment and resignation. She looked away.

_It's too late anyway, Jack. You've already lost me. You can't save me. And I don't want you to._

* * *

><p>Dr. Lecter gave the apartment door three firm raps with his knuckles. The cheap, thin wood rattled in its frame. The dim hall light did little to illuminate his surroundings; a courtesy, to his way of thinking, as the worn wallpaper and carpeting appeared to have been unchanged since the days when misguided minds believed enormous floral patterns and minuscule checkered patterns were made for one another.<p>

He stood squarely in front of the door; should the occupant, upon peering through the peephole, choose not to allow him entry, he would simply leave his gift on the doorstep – with the addition of the letter resting in the inside pocket of his gabardine – and depart.

Footsteps approached. The thin line of light visible under the door fragmented. A slight whistling noise signaled a long, indrawn breath through flattened lips.

The clack of the deadbolt unlocking echoed in the hall. The door opened.

"Good evening, Barney."

"Evening, Dr. Lecter." Wide eyes communicated Barney's anxiety; one hand clutched the door in a tight grip. "Did you… did you want to come in?"

"Thank you, Barney; that's very kind of you."

The doctor stepped inside, his senses attuned to the rapid heartbeat and scent of fear emanating from the larger man. His nostrils flared as he breathed more deeply to savor the moment.

"Would it ease you to know that my intentions here are entirely pedestrian, Barney? You've done me a service; I have merely come to thank you for it."

Barney closed the door and gestured toward the small kitchen table.

"Can I, uh, offer you a seat?"

"Thank you, no; I won't stay long. This meeting is, perhaps, less comfortable for you than our old chats, hmm?"

"It's… different, sure. I wasn't expecting, uh, well… this."

"I thought you might enjoy a token of my appreciation for your excellent care of our mutual friend." He laid his gift on the table. The book thumped softly when he pulled his fingers back. "As I recall, you quite enjoyed our discussions of art; you may find this work on the Dutch masters interesting. One should never neglect one's cultural education."

"Thank you, Dr. Lecter. That's real thoughtful of you." Barney's hand reached out; a single finger slid along the edge of the book's spine. "You didn't have to bring me anything, though. This job… you set it up through my employer just like my regular assignments, so you must've paid the going rate or I wouldn't have got my paycheck like normal. You didn't owe me anything extra."

"No? Do your employers, your clients, perhaps, regularly leave meals and messages in your car, then, Barney? I doubt they do. You accommodated such… quirks, shall we say?… with silence and grace. I could not have entrusted her care to any other and been so satisfied with the result."

Barney's flickering eyes finally met his own and held for a moment. His lips parted before he looked away.

"Speak your mind, Barney; you've obviously formed some opinion you wish to share."

The silence persisted. The doctor waited. When Barney spoke, his topic was not entirely unexpected.

"She's sweet on you. She doesn't say, but…." He shrugged. "I'm sure you know that already."

The doctor maintained his pleasantly neutral expression. Barney had proved himself an ally; some leeway would not be an overly luxurious recompense.

"And I know she's a big girl – she wouldn't thank anybody for trying to fight her battles – and I know maybe I'm crossing a line here…." He shifted uncomfortably; the scent of his fear grew stronger in the doctor's nose. His fingers stroked the book. "Just… it's not just her, right? She's not alone?"

"Are you asking if her heart is safe in my keeping, Barney? Whether I have encouraged her _tendre_ for me only to crush her cruelly at some later time of my choosing?"

Unhappy lines formed on Barney's face, a furrow in his brow, a pursing of his lips.

"Yeah, but… not just that. I mean, all those years, the so-called experts parading in and out and trying to mess with you, they all said you don't feel things like love. That you can't. But… you do. For her. Right? So you'd be… happy… together?"

The doctor studied the man before him. It had taken great courage for Barney to voice such questions – and it seemed he did so not out of prurient curiosity, but rather as an assurance that his loyalty had not been misplaced, that Clarice would be loved and the doctor himself fulfilled as he had not been in his cage in the Baltimore dungeon.

He smiled, carefully, politely, not showing his teeth.

"I believe so, yes. I feel many things for Clarice, Barney; they are private things, shared with her alone. Likewise, what she chooses to accept and embrace is for her alone to decide. But your concern for our welfare is not unappreciated."

Barney's face relaxed, sliding into a smile of his own – not smugness, but joy.

"I'm happy for you, Dr. Lecter. You and her both."

The doctor tipped his head in acknowledgement as he stepped back.

"Thank you, Barney. I'll leave you to your evening pursuits; I don't wish to impose upon your time any further."

He pulled open the door and departed before the younger man could respond. He did hope Barney would keep his knowledge to himself; a slip, whether accidental or intentional, could make things quite… messy. And Clarice, he expected, would be distressed were Barney to meet with misfortune. No, this loose thread would not be snipped.

_The things one does for love._


	17. Chapter 17

Round four. _Here we go._

Clarice had met with Curtis Taylor, full-of-himself psychologist extraordinaire, after the warehouse shootout nearly two years ago now. He hadn't been impressive then, and he hadn't aged well since. But meeting with him was part of the protocol – part of what she needed to leave quietly without having anyone looking for her later. Without putting anyone on the doctor's trail.

She'd given him monosyllabic answers in the first three sessions this time around. It was time to show some vulnerability, she thought, to let him think he was getting to her. _Any advice, Doctor?_

_I'm certain you remember, Clarice.… "Do you have something you use, when you need to get up your courage? Memories, tableaux…."_

_Right. Vulnerability. That's easy. I'll just think about how I feel when you look at me like…."_

_Yes, Clarice? Finish your thought._

"Like I'm the only thing you see," she murmured.

Taylor looked up from his notepad.

"What was that, Clarice?"

She shook her head.

"Nothing, I… I was just thinking out loud."

"About the incident?"

She looked down, avoiding his eyes. _C'mon, go for it here, buddy. I can only do shy and conflicted for so long before I need to hit something._

His fingers stroked the edge of his chair.

"Your incident report states that you were pinned by a knife-wielding attacker who out-weighed you."

It wasn't a question, but Taylor was clearly waiting on her answer.

"Yes, that's correct."

"And how were you feeling in that moment?"

Silence. He, no doubt, expected her to admit to fear – or, given her occupation and reputation, to deny that fear with a lie. But in that moment, fear had not been uppermost in her mind. She had found a state of perfect calm, of clarity, with the doctor's voice for her guide.

_Ha! I ought to tell him I hear voices and see what he makes of that._

_Am I merely one among the chorus, then, Clarice?_

_Hardly, Doctor. You've always had the starring role._

"Clarice?" Taylor leaned forward slightly. Maybe he thought it was an encouragement, an invitation, but his posture and tone suggested nothing short of demand.

"Can you articulate how you felt? You're safe here. The experience is behind you. We're only looking at small pieces here. As much as you feel able to handle."

_Small pieces? Yeah, I chew those up and spit them out._

_Not to worry, Clarice. We'll work on your table manners._

She turned away, bringing a hand to her face to hide her smile. It took a moment before she could face Taylor again – and the practiced look of sympathetic concern on his face nearly set her off again.

"Sorry," she choked out. "I just… it's hard to talk about."

He rushed, as usual, to validate her perceived feelings.

"Of course, of course. Please, don't apologize, Clarice. I'm only here to help you work through this trauma. However you feel about it is right. There's nothing you can say that would be unacceptable. Try not to censor yourself."

_This is so much harder than I thought it would be, Doctor. My god. How do you ever get through a conversation with a straight face?_

_Practice, my dear. A great deal of practice. Shall we make an intimate study of it together? Catalog your responses until you appear entirely serene no matter what… distractions… I employ? _

She stood in a rush, eager to stop her mind from going _there,_ of all places, in front of the overly solicitous idiot facing her.

"I was…." She paced a bit, less from real agitation than from the desire to be perceived as under stress.

_Calm, and then… nothing. Feral. Frenzied. Washed in blood and not bothered by it. Like… a baptism._

She sighed, pausing in mid-step.

"I don't think I can talk about this today."

His voice was soft.

"You haven't spoken of it in the previous three sessions, Clarice. I think it's time to push forward a bit. You'll need to if you want to get back to work."

She didn't have to fake discomfort then; it was obvious enough for even Taylor to pick up on, thankfully.

"Is that what you want, Clarice?"

Finally, the right opening.

"I don't… I'm not…." She carefully lowered herself back into her seat, avoiding his eyes. She hushed her voice, as though afraid of what she was about to say. "I don't know if I can do this anymore."

"This?"

"The… the job. I don't… I don't know if I want to."

_Brava, Clarice. I particularly enjoyed that little hitch in your voice. Now don't overplay your hand; you've set the wheels in motion._

She looked up at Taylor, feigning something of wide-eyed panic in her gaze and bringing an angry firmness to her voice.

"Forget it. We're done for the day. I'm not talking about this shit anymore."

She exaggerated her difficulty in rising once more and vehemently waved off Taylor's offer of assistance.

"I'm fine. I got this. I don't need your help."

She hid her smile as she left with what hopefully appeared to be more speed than sense. If she was especially lucky, Taylor was making notes even now about her somewhat unbalanced mental state and her unwillingness to discuss the incident or her feelings about it. A few more sessions of supposed emotional revelations and lessening resistance, and her departure from the FBI would look no more suspicious than any other resignation on traumatic grounds.

* * *

><p>Hannibal Lecter stood politely aside as his real estate agent unlocked the front door in silence and entered before fluidly gesturing him inside.<p>

He was not, of course, Hannibal Lecter today. He was Edmund Frei, a wealthy, semi-retired German investor seeking a temporary vacation home with which to impress his new, young, American fiancée – a delightful girl who had, sadly, never been to Switzerland. Thus was he here, on the outskirts of Bern, looking at homes.

This was the second day of his house-hunting excursion. His agent had learned quickly the day before and no longer assaulted his ears with prattling sales pitches. He did not point out amenities or mention costs. He did not, in fact, speak unless invited to do so. The doctor made a mental note to include a bonus for the gentleman upon the conclusion of his business.

He expected he would be away from Clarice for no more than ten days, accounting for travel time and arrangements to prepare the house for their arrival at an unknown future date. His specifications for their new temporary home were both scientific and unscientific. The former made it a simple matter to rule out a significant number of options; he wanted a bit of land and open sight lines for security, a second bedroom to allow Clarice to make her own choices, a space suitable as a music room if one was not present, a welcoming kitchen that would encourage Clarice's desire for domesticity… the reasons flipped through his mind like file cards. It was the unscientific reasons that had caused him to reject the first five homes.

It was not a matter of décor – that could be easily altered. It was not a matter of room size or placement. No, this was something more intangible – a certainty that when he had found the correct home, Clarice would approve. That he would somehow know. That she would… speak to him.

So although he was pleased to find a grand piano as the front hall opened into a living space clearly designed for entertaining, and although he was pleased to find two bedrooms on the second floor, a master suite and a guest room with its own bath, it was not until he stood in the kitchen and stared out the doors leading to a large terrace with a snow-covered lawn and wooded trails beyond that he knew.

The trails would allow for cross country skiing or snowshoeing – both suitable lower-impact replacements for running. The activity would make Clarice breathe hard, exercising the diaphragmatic abdominal muscles that would need strengthening during her recovery and – with the addition of poles – stretching the long muscles of her legs and arms, which no doubt carried a great deal of tension now, he thought, recalling her small steps in the parking lot outside her doctor's office.

And afterward, he expected, she would be in need of warmth and massage to ease her – services he would gladly provide. His fingers itched to touch her.

Her voice teased him then.

_So, you think you've found it?_

_I believe so, yes, Clarice._

_And the thought that won you over was me, naked under your hands?_

_Mmm. _She did put lovely images into his head.

_You know, don't you, Doctor, that I'd happily let you do __**that**__ anywhere?_

_Would you? _His mental voice surprised him in its uncertainty.

_Ohhh, yeah. So you'd better snap this place up quick, Doctor. I like the way it makes you think._

He smiled at his reflection in the window glass, picturing her face over his shoulder, her arms wrapped tightly around him. He lifted his voice and spoke in German – standard, not the High Alemannic of the native Swiss in the area – aware of the realty agent waiting a polite distance away.

"Herr Stollart? This one will do nicely, I think."

When the arrangements had been finalized, the doctor had a rental contract that began immediately and extended through the end of February. It would allow leeway for Clarice; he could not precisely predict how long she intended to remain with the Bureau. She was determined to make her departure seem a natural end to things, unworthy of suspicion. It was… thoughtful… of her, no matter that it frustrated them both, he expected.

Once he had her here, however, he would plan to allow all of the time they both needed to adjust to this new situation – this _partnership_. Time had been what he lacked in Saarbrucken; she had needed to return to work before her mind had had time to process her emotional upheaval. Had he had another week with her then….

Well. It made no difference now. So the doctor took his time selecting appropriate clothing and linens, picturing them against the coloration of Clarice's skin and hair, bright and deep like her eyes. He sorted through the kitchen goods, storing the pedestrian equipment in boxes in the attached garage and replacing it with high-quality implements. He stocked the pantry staples and had the piano tuned. He added books and music to the front room, and sheet music and a well-crafted violin, and arranged the furniture in a more pleasing, cozy display for two. He did not expect to be hosting dinner parties with Clarice at his side, though the idea did hold a strong appeal for him. _Not yet, but someday, perhaps. _

He interviewed housekeepers and arranged for one to visit weekly to keep the linens fresh and stock perishables for their eventual arrival.

His thoughts, always, remained with Clarice, no matter what task he was simultaneously accomplishing. The activity was welcome. When he returned to Virginia to wait for her, there would be little for him to do. He no longer had Barney as a go-between; she did not need meals from him; he could hardly follow her to work every day at Quantico, fun challenge though that might be. He would need to be patient and cautious. Immerse himself in hobbies and distractions.


	18. Chapter 18

It was frustration, not pain, that gnawed endlessly at her gut.

Frustration with her weakness, which kept her from going for a long run. Just walking a few blocks was enough to leave her winded.

Frustration with waiting, even though it had been her choice and was, she knew, safer for them both.

Frustration with finally knowing with crystal clarity who she was and what she wanted – and being required to hide both from the moment she carefully rolled out of bed in the morning to the moment she closed her eyes once more and pictured his face in her dreams.

And frustration now because making dinner was supposed to help her feel _closer_ to Hannibal, not make her feel the stab of his absence more keenly. But the first attempt had yielded chicken breasts charred on the outside and raw on the inside. It had gone straight into the trash can.

The second attempt wasn't going much better. And she knew whatever was wrong was something simple – something to which she could intuit the answer if he were there to ask the right question.

But she didn't know the right question, and so his voice in her mind remained stubbornly silent on the matter.

_Patience, Clarice._

_I don't want patience. I want you._

_I believe what you want in this moment is dinner._

_Same thing._

_How flattering, to be held in the same esteem as greasy sacks of cheap fare decidedly lacking all redeeming value._

_You could see it that way, sure. Or you could see it as being something I crave on a daily basis, something nourishing and necessary, a moment of stability and peace and safety and family and warmth and—_

She turned off the burner, afraid her shaking hands and blurred vision would ruin more than the meal. The front door opened and closed; footsteps came toward the kitchen.

"Hey, roomie! Ardelia to the rescue! I picked up a burger and fries for you, too, just in case." Clarice heard the slap of the fast-food bags hitting the table behind her. "No luck with the chicken thing yet?"

Clarice cleared her throat.

"Only if you want to risk salmonella."

"I'll pass, thanks. More practice needed?"

"Guess so."

"That's good, though." Ardelia laughed. "I was worried you were going to be all obsessed about work now that you're finally back at it. You know – overdoing it, staying late, pushing yourself. I bet you'll be real happy when this light duty trauma shit is over and you can start kicking down doors. You just wait, Cee – I predict this new cooking fad of yours is gonna faaaade away as soon as you get your gun back."

Clarice tossed out the failed chicken experiment with more force than the task required and then began wiping down the countertop with a dishtowel. Her arm swiped harshly over the surface.

_That isn't gonna happen. I'm not gonna give up on… new things… just because they dangle the promise of getting back to the job in front of me. I'm not. _

_Of course you aren't, my dear. But you weren't intending to tell Ms. Mapp that._

_No… but I need her to understand that I'm ready to go, even if she doesn't know the real reason why. I need her to be OK with it, not to feel like she needs to keep tabs on me later. _

_Then you'll need to think of her as you do your friend Dr. Taylor, Clarice. _

_That man is not my friend._

_No. He's your pawn. As is Ms. Mapp, in this._

Clarice winced. She knocked her knee against the cabinet in front of her, causing an ache to ripple through her, and was grateful for the pain that helped her focus.

"Have you ever pulled your gun, Dee? For real, not in training."

"A couple of times, sure. Serving warrants on flight risks."

"Ever taken a shot at someone?"

"No… I would've told you if I had; you know all my stories."

"I've killed six, Dee. Six people in less than three years. And I've watched five agents die. You don't think that shit fucks with your head? Because it does. It does. And I'm not... I don't want... I can't do this anymore. Shit. I just—"

She turned around and sank to the floor, heedless of the pain it caused, glad for it, really, because didn't the pain make her sharper? Didn't it remind her of who she was? Her breaths came deeper, faster, and burned through her chest like fire. Tears leaked out while she gasped for air. Her vision of Ardelia blurred, but she could see the look of shock on her face well enough. Clarice Starling didn't _do _breakdowns. Not the Clarice that Ardelia knew.

Her roommate crouched down in front of her and pulled her into a tight hug.

"You gotta breathe, girl. I'm sorry, I didn't think — I just didn't think." Ardelia's hand ran up and down her back in a motherly caress. Clarice could only think of the doctor's hands — warmer, larger, more deft and firm. Those were the hands she wanted. She let his absence fuel her misery and sobbed harder. If she didn't have the courage to leave, this was all she would ever have — a record of kills, a map of scars, and a friend who never knew the real her.

She pushed back from Ardelia, leaning her head against the kitchen cabinet behind her, and took gulping breaths.

"I need... to get out... before it... fucks me up more."

"You mean… _out _out? Of _the FBI_?"

Ardelia sat dumbly on the kitchen floor, her arms fallen to her sides, her eyes blinking in disbelief. Clarice forced herself to breathe more slowly.

"But you… you _love _this job. How many nights did we stay up quizzing each other—"

"I _loved_ it, Dee. But I don't anymore. I walk in the building and I feel… empty, you know? And I need…." Clarice shrugged, knowing she couldn't tell Ardelia the whole truth. "I need more than that."

They stared silently for a moment, Clarice displaying a pain that was not entirely feigned, Ardelia looking back in confusion. Finally, Ardelia nodded.

"OK, Cee. I get it. I do. But you know I'm your friend no matter where you're working, right? So if you need, I dunno, whatever, you can talk to me."

"Thanks, Dee." _But you're not the one I need._ "C'mon, let's get the hell off the floor and eat those burgers before they get cold."

She let Ardelia help her up, because it made Dee happy, and sat down at the table to eat entirely unhealthy food that the doctor would undoubtedly chastise her for if he knew.

What was he doing tonight? Was he sitting at a table alone? Did frustration and need ache as keenly in him as they did in her? Was he missing her the way she was missing him?

_Well, Doctor? Do you need me as much as I need you? _

_You know the answer to that, Clarice. _

_Yes._

* * *

><p>A visit to the National Gallery had seemed a pleasant enough diversion for the day. The doctor might wander the halls at his leisure, he expected, finding fine art sufficient to dislodge thoughts of Clarice from the forefront of his mind. And he had not been entirely inaccurate in his estimation.<p>

Not, that was, until he had come upon one of the gallery's current temporary exhibitions in the West Building.

Italian sculptor Giambologna's beauteous _Cesarini Venus_, fully restored, in its first foray beyond Italian shores. A glorious vision in marble. A study of the nude female form, Venus, love's very essence, fresh from the bath, hair piled atop her head, washcloth pressed to one breast and a larger swath of fabric draped over an upraised thigh.

_Clarice._

She pressed on his mind: the remembered scent of her in his nostrils; the taste and feel of her breast in his mouth from their brief interlude in Saarbrucken; the sound of water against her skin as she showered with only a thin door between them. He was stuck fast, unable to move, under memory's sweet assault.

He remained with Venus until closing, thoroughly enchanted.

And afterward, returning to his original plans for the day, he attended a performance of _Carmina Burana_. The melodramatic excess of love and despair suited his mood. The baritone soloist of "Omnia sol temperat" was particularly affecting, he felt, as he neared the end of the piece.

"Ama me fideliter, / fidem meam noto: / de corde totaliter / et ex mente tota / sum presentialiter / absens in remota, / quisquis amat taliter, / volvitur in rota."

The English translation came to him effortlessly.

_Love me faithfully! See how I am faithful: with all my heart and with all my soul, I am with you even when I am far away. Whosoever loves this much turns on the wheel. _

The concert had been enjoyable, if not a suitable distraction, as the subject matter merely directed his thoughts to Clarice. He returned to his lodgings afterward, preferring silence and solitude to intrusive restaurant chatter. But it was not so silent as he supposed. As he prepared dinner — a simple chicken dish on a bed of rice — he found himself accompanied by her voice.

_Is there room for two in here?_

"For you, my dear, always." He sliced the chicken breasts in half while the pan heated on the stove, trimming each piece to maintain even sizing.

_You've been thinking about me all day._

"How could I not? All that I see reminds me of your loveliness." He tested the pan with a few drops of water; the sizzle proclaimed it ready. The butter went in and began to foam and brown.

_Sweet talker._

"Only the truth, Clarice." He seared the chicken on high heat, sautéing for a few minutes only. A light touch was needed.

_To me, yes. What about yourself, Doctor? Are you as rigorously truthful with yourself?_

He set the chicken aside to keep warm, turned off the heat below the rice to allow it to finish cooking in the closed pot, and added a bit of white wine to the sauté pan.

"I try to be, my dear."

Shallots next, and then garlic. The aroma filled the small kitchenette.

_Then why won't you admit what you're doing?_

He paused before adding the remaining wine and raising the heat to facilitate the reduction.

"I am making dinner. I admit it freely, my dear."

_What a comedian. Are you afraid of the truth?_

"What truth is it you wish me to admit, Clarice? That I long for your presence? That I must force myself to find entertainment and enjoyment in activities I once found pleasing? That my joy in them is diminished for want of you?"

Her voice came gently.

_That you're lonely._

"I am _alone_, yes." His voice was clipped.

He added the chicken stock and let it reduce. He added the heavy cream. When the sauce had properly thickened, he turned off the heat. He plated the rice first, adding the chicken next and finally spooning the sauce over the top.

"That does not mean I am _lonely_, Clarice."

He was a singular creature. He did not require stimulation from those around him. He had spent eight years in near solitude, with only Barney for pleasant company, until she had stood in front of his cell with her courage and determination.

_Doesn't it?_

"You know it doesn't." He moved the food to the table and pulled out his chair.

_Doctor…._

"Dinner is served, Clarice."

_Look at the table._

"The chicken will grow cold if you insist upon playing games, Clarice."

_Look at it, dammit. _

"I'm certain I recall precisely how…."

His voice trailed into silence as he truly looked at the table.

Two wine glasses. Two sets of silverware. Two identically plated dishes of chicken and rice.

He seated himself with less grace than was customary, and stared across the small expanse. One empty chair.

_You're lonely, Doctor._

Awareness of his surroundings was bone-deep in him. It was not something he relinquished, ever. That he had been so distracted, so enveloped in thoughts of her that he might forget, even for a moment….

"Forgive me, Clarice. I am humbly corrected."

Her voice in his mind was not the same as her presence. He had made a mental allowance, a _shift_, at some unknown point, one that accommodated for her even when she was not there. One that assumed she would be.

Dinner, though prepared to perfection, left him cold.


	19. Chapter 19

Clarice had, since her return to the office, been allowed back on light duty – and it was truly _light_ duty, as she was still barred from lifting anything greater than ten pounds unless she wanted to risk reinjuring her muscles. Carrying young Maggie Ludhin about and making her way back to the SUV had further damaged the fibers rent by the knife thrusting and sawing in her gut. It would be months yet before she regained her full strength. She wasn't even allowed to go running yet; the repetitive striking motion of her feet and the swinging of her arms would be too much of a jolt, according to her physician. Running could tear open the muscles in her side. Recertification testing for her weapon was a long way off.

Which Taylor had mentioned now, during the second of her twice-weekly sessions this week – the seventh total, last week having been a short one for the Thanksgiving holiday – and thus why she was currently not answering. Because the truth, of course, was that she didn't give a damn, as she'd get a gun back when she felt she needed one, and the only doctor who mattered would either approve or keep his mouth shut. _OK, maybe not shut, exactly – but he wouldn't stop me, either._

The correct answer, though, lay somewhere between disappointment and relief. It was that mix of lies that she needed to sell to Taylor. Things she did not feel.

_Yes. Simply express what you do not feel and allow the uneasiness such dishonesty causes you to show through, Clarice. The tension and discomfort will reinforce what he expects to see._

_I know that, Doctor._

_Of course you do, my dear; I am merely a projection of your unconscious, a manifestation of your own mind. You already know everything I tell you. You simply prefer hearing it in my voice. Still struggling with those authority issues, Clarice?_

Ouch. _Well, I sure as hell know where to poke myself to make it hurt._

"Yeah, months, maybe, before my body will stand up to the recoil. Fieldwork…." She swallowed and looked away, crossing her left arm across her body so her palm protectively shielded her injury in a seemingly unconscious tic. "Fieldwork is a long way off."

"And that fact brings you some stress? Or are you… _relieved_… to hear it?"

He no doubt thought he was being subtle. _Newsflash, buddy: I'm relieved that you think I'm relieved, not that I won't be in the field anymore. Not being out there rescuing lambs is gonna put me on edge. I wonder if the doctor would—_

She stopped herself then, before she found herself seriously contemplating the notion of vigilante justice with a willing, eager partner who would… creatively… dispose of any bodies she left in her wake.

"I know what you're thinking, Clarice. It's alright to say the words aloud."

"You have no idea what I'm thinking."

Oops. She hadn't meant to say that thought out loud. _If he had any idea what I was thinking now, he'd be on the phone to Jack Crawford already and begging him to lock me up._

"The prospect of going back to fieldwork frightens you." Taylor spread his hands in a placating gesture. "Being afraid makes you feel helpless. Feeling helpless makes you angry. You can express those feelings here, Clarice. If you don't, I won't be able to help you work through them – and I won't be able to sign off on your mental fitness for duty. Unless that's the outcome you're hoping for, Clarice."

He leaned forward and tipped his head; an attempt to catch her eyes, she knew. She looked firmly away.

"We've touched on this topic before. Have you given it further thought? Do you still wish to pursue a career with the FBI as an active field agent?"

She let the silence hang between them. This was her seventh session. It had been six weeks since her release from the hospital and just over three since her return to light work, with the addition of required counseling and physical therapy-style gym sessions. It was the first week of December now, and she wanted… _I want Hannibal for Christmas._

"No," she whispered, with no need to feign the relief in her voice. "I don't think I do. I don't… it's too much. I don't want to put myself in that situation again."

_Not with inadequate backup, anyway. Hannibal would have never—_

And now she was thinking about it again. About… hunting. With Hannibal. _Jesus._

"OK, Clarice. That's OK. It's good to talk about these feelings, to get them out in the open." Taylor had obviously noted her edginess; not knowing its cause, he clearly believed himself an excellent therapist to have pulled the truth from her finally.

She was suddenly tired of it, tired of all of it, of all of the lying. She wanted to see the one man she never needed to lie to, the one who could look into her soul and see even what she could not.

"I'm going to resign," she said, quietly. "I can't… can't function like this."

"You wouldn't have to leave the FBI, Clarice, even if you wanted to step away from fieldwork. A desk job—"

"No. No." She shook her head. "It's not the work – it's me. I'm not the same person I was when I started this job. If I don't leave now, I'm going to lose what little sanity I have left."

And that, she thought, was no lie.

Taylor nodded as he jotted notes on his leather-bound legal pad.

"Crawford didn't help things by throwing you in the deep end before you'd even graduated. There's no shame in burning out, Clarice. You've had a rough time of it."

Her face twitched; she ducked her head and pressed her fingertips to her forehead to hide the anger she couldn't quite control. _You think I'm too weak for this job? Fuck you. I'm not too weak for it – it's a crutch I don't need anymore. _

_Temper, Clarice. You've shown him precisely what you needed to; you've reached the outcome you desired. It's galling to be so misunderstood, I know, but this cretin is unworthy, undeserving, of knowing the real Clarice Starling. Let go of the anger for now, hmm?_

She blew out a breath, pleased when it did not set off a riot of pain, and raised her head, calmer now.

"I think… I think it'll take a while for the idea of not being ashamed to sink in."

The practiced, sympathetic smile was no more than she expected, as was the pleased flicker in Taylor's eyes. Of course he was gratified to be proven right, to have his conception of her validated. That he was entirely wrong was of no consequence.

* * *

><p>110 days. From Hannibal Lecter's last sight of Clarice Starling in Saarbrucken in June until her bloodied face had appeared on the television in October, he had set his thoughts of her aside – a dream marked someday-but-not-yet. When he found his thoughts straying to her, he refocused elsewhere. It was a delaying tactic, nothing more.<p>

He could not have remained near her in that time and guaranteed his own safety and freedom. The risks had been too high, and such a deliberate, constant presence in her life would no doubt have carried a whiff of pressure, if not desperation, to her mind. He would not force her to accept his love, though they both knew she wished to do so.

Now, however, he had her full cooperation. Now he could be sufficiently certain that she was ready to try, at least, and yet still he could not spend his days in her presence.

He could not watch the flickering emotions in her eyes. He could not feel the gentle clasp of strong fingers so tentatively reaching for his own. He could not hear the catch in her breath when he surprised her or the deepening of her accent when he touched some chord within her and drew out her emotions like an endlessly flowing fount. He could not smell the richness of her desire or taste the salt of her skin.

And memory… memory no longer soothed him in this. No, he wanted new experiences, new words, new laughter, new delights with Clarice Starling to fill his senses.

He no longer had a connection to her through Barney's assistance; he could not satisfy his needs by providing meals, comfort, and safety for her.

He could not follow her; she would note the tail, as might other observant eyes, if any existed, among her FBI colleagues. They would not catch him, of course, but they might put her in protective custody if they believed him a threat to her.

He could not call upon her directly, lest Ms. Mapp be caught in the middle. Clarice would not thank him for endangering her friend, no matter how tenuous the bond between the women had become.

He could not seek out prey to provide distraction and amusement; even if such activities did not lead authorities to his door, they would be risky and unwise, heightening scrutiny and possibly causing difficulties for his travel plans.

The restrictions chafed, a constant reminder of the freedoms he had not enjoyed while a guest at the Baltimore asylum. Only for Clarice would he accept such conditions. Clarice, whose face and feet and body lay scattered about his suite now. The curve of her calves beneath the fluttering hem of a sundress here, the swell of her breasts in the open bodice of an evening gown there, the sweep of an arched brow above knowing, sparkling eyes.…

He pulled another sheet from the oversized sketchpad he had purchased this morning, allowing the fine lines of her hands, fingers interlocking with his own, to slip to the floor. The curve of her shoulder captured his thoughts next, the strength in the line of her arm… his pen moved swiftly across the paper, putting memory into ink as it bled out through his fingertips.

Hours passed, until the light was no longer sufficient even for his heightened visual capabilities and he sat surrounded by dozens of sketches of his love. It was not yet enough.

Her near-fatal experience had conjured an irrational need in him that sometimes subsided but never fully left him. He pursued the feeling with analytical detachment, recognizing the manifestation of psychological trauma for what it was, uncertain of when he had last experienced it. Perhaps never. Perhaps… a chill took him, and he pushed the thoughts away. His own hesitation irritated him.

Very well. If he could not drive out the irrationality, he would embrace it. But he would not put Clarice at risk to fulfill his own needs. He would need to find the right moment, the right place, to approach her, so their meeting would be entirely unremarkable.

Yes. That thought, finally, soothed him, appeasing the need for her. He would think on Clarice and her habits, and he would see her soon.


	20. Chapter 20

The metal rattle of the grocery cart echoed loudly in the parking lot. It grated on Clarice's ears. She didn't usually shop; hell, she didn't usually cook. But she'd decided tonight was the right time for another attempt at creating dinner for herself – preferably without a nervous breakdown this time.

_I've been doing a lot of things I don't usually do. That doesn't mean I don't like them once I've tried them._

"It doesn't mean they aren't _me_," she muttered. "As if that ass knows a thing about me."

Her final session with Taylor still rubbed at sore spots. It was stupid, she admitted. She'd gotten what she needed out of it – a plausible excuse for leaving the FBI without drawing attention to herself – and yet she still wanted something more. Wanted them to see what she was. Wanted them to admit _they_ were the wrong ones. The weak ones. Wanted _Jack_ to admit it.

Part of it was that she was lonely, dammit. She didn't need to fake depression at work to support her cover story; withdrawn and distracted pretty well described her every waking moment. She'd had glimpses of the life waiting for her, and she was eager for it to arrive. And now she'd made it official at work, but she had no way to communicate that to _him_.

She had to wait. Patiently. As if patience were something she had in abundance.

It wasn't.

Clarice raised a hand to her forehead, rubbing between her eyes in a futile attempt to stave off the headache she could feel building. The hum of traffic on the adjacent street wasn't helping. And the grocery store was busy, cars moving in and out of the lot, the occasional tire screech as a driver got a little too close to a slow-moving shopper, kids unhappy with being dragged to the store after Mom or Dad had picked them up, car doors slamming and feet stomping, younger children quasi-verbally insisting that it was definitely dinnertime already… it was a noisy, annoying mess, and she was navigating it at the end of her tether.

Her car was the next one on the left side of the aisle. She stopped the cart and popped the trunk. The clerk had followed her request to keep the bags light, though she'd felt like some blue-haired senior citizen asking. Now she had nearly more bags in the cart than she did purchases.

She lifted the first bag into the trunk. Linguini noodles. Dried, not fresh. _Hannibal wouldn't approve_.

She picked up the second bag. Lettuce. For the pre-pasta salad. Because yeah, she was going to make more than one dish for this meal. _There's a first time for everything._

_It won't make you feel closer to him, you know. It'll just make you miss him more. Are you gonna set an extra place at the table? Light candles? Buy yourself flowers?_

She realized, abruptly, that a set of footsteps she had assumed was passing toward the store had in fact moved closer. _Great. That's just what I need. Some idiot who thinks a meat market is a meet market._

She turned, ready to chase off whoever had made the mistake of approaching her. And then she just stopped.

"Han—" She held back, barely, from almost-shouting his name in the parking lot of her neighborhood grocery chain. "Hello."

* * *

><p>He had startled her. She had stumbled over her greeting – and wasn't it interesting, he thought, that she seemed to have instinctively reached for his name rather than his title in her surprise.<p>

"I don't make a habit of approaching strange women in parking lots, but I felt compelled to make an exception in your case." He smiled, broadly gesturing to her cart to deflect suspicion as another patron rolled a cart to a vehicle in the next row. "May I assist you with your bags?"

Clarice's eyes flicked sideways for a moment; yes, she had noted the extra presence as well.

"Thank you; I'd appreciate that." Her voice carried a bit in the open air. "I had surgery a few weeks ago, and my doctor doesn't want me overdoing it."

"No," he agreed, more quietly, "I'm certain he doesn't."

He lifted a bag from her cart and moved to place it in the trunk. She had not stepped back; his coat brushed her arm.

"I turned in my resignation." Her voice was soft, but it rang with suppressed excitement. "December 17 will be my last day."

He felt an answering thrill of excitement, which he ruthlessly controlled. Clarice wanted to make her exit on her own terms, and he would not endanger her choice by causing a scene.

Instead, he smiled politely – a man making pleasant conversation with an attractive stranger, nothing more – and quietly spoke as he took his time placing another bag in the trunk. She was planning a dinner, it seemed. Salad. A pasta dish of some sort. Bread from the bakery.

"And after that, Clarice? Perhaps you'd like to travel, hmm? Book a trip to Paris again?"

She nodded; there was something of a coy thoughtfulness in her voice when she replied.

"Delia _has_ said it's the perfect place to meet the love of my life."

He hummed softly and replied in the same playful tone.

"Should I be worried, Clarice? Perhaps you ought to go elsewhere, lest you find this mysterious love and toss me aside."

She grasped his hand with her own, hidden in the shadows of the car's trunk.

"You have _nothing_ to worry about."

So she said, and so she must believe, he thought, and yet… a small bag of shrimp, the scent of fresh seafood rising in the air. Enough for two servings, perhaps, from the weight.

"Planning dinner for two, Clarice? You're expanding your culinary repertoire, it seems. Pasta, seafood, salad, bread… is someone special already waiting at home?"

His tone was still light, teasing; he did not expect she had another beau. But the idea rankled all the same, that she was preparing a meal – an activity in which she had admitted she almost never engaged, one that seemed intimately linked to their own connection – for someone other than him. Her roommate, perhaps.

"Only Ardelia," she confirmed. But then she glanced about them – though he could have told her in an instant that no other store patrons currently lingered nearby – and moved a half-step closer. "But I wasn't thinking of her when I decided to make dinner."

She paused, a small furrow appearing between her eyes, and added, "Ho voluto sentire vicino a te. Mi manchi."

_I wanted to feel close to you. I miss you. _

Her choice of words, limited by a beginning speaker's understanding and the book he had given Barney to encourage her studies, suggested a much more neighborly affection than she likely meant to express – indeed, her mental voice whispered to him of more intimate closeness: _volevo sentire piu intimo con te_ - but her sentiment was so painfully clear in her face that it was difficult not to pull her into his embrace.

"Tentatrice dolce mia," he murmured. His sweet temptress. "You've been studying."

"I had a lot of free time. And it's not so different from Spanish or French."

Much as he wished to continue conversing, he was running out of bags in her shopping cart – and, likewise, a plausible reason to be standing beside her.

"Then we'll have much to talk about when we meet in Paris, Clarice."

"Right. Time's shorter now." Her eyes tracked his hand as he placed the final bag in the trunk. "I'll need to get a flight that weekend – Sunday, so I can wrap up stuff at the house Saturday."

"Ms. Mapp will wish to accompany you to the airport, will she not?"

"Yeah, she'll insist on it. I can put her off, but…."

"But it will deflect any suspicion in her mind if you allow it."

"Yup."

"Not to worry, Clarice. I'll make arrangements to join you elsewhere. Take your flight Sunday and we'll see how events proceed from there, hmm?"

"You're being awfully accommodating for a man who supposedly can't wait to get me alone." Her hip bumped his, lightly, as her voice teased.

"I can afford to be magnanimous, Clarice. Ms. Mapp will occupy your time and attention for but a short span. I expect to do so for—"

"Eternity."

"Pardon?"

"That's how long you'll hold my attention."

"You make my pretensions to restraint quite a challenge, Clarice."

"Good. That just means we're on the same wavelength."

"Mmm. I could hardly leave you out there alone, my dear."

"No, you wouldn't, I know." Her tone had turned serious, tinged with a hint of something… self-recrimination, perhaps. Did she still feel guilt for leaving him in June? As though she had something to prove to him? Now was not the time to ask her, however, as she was closing the trunk. Left hand only, he noted; reaching with her right arm might still be a carefully planned movement for her lest she overtax healing tissue.

"Thanks for your help; I really appreciate it." Her voice was louder now, carrying a bit, and her body had shifted away from his.

"Not at all," he replied, in an equally neutral tone. "I'm pleased I was able to assist."

"I should…." She gestured toward the car.

He laid a hand on the shopping cart.

"Certainly. I'll return this for you."

She smiled at him, a touch wistfully, he thought.

"You always know just what I need," she murmured, her voice too soft to carry. "And I definitely needed to see you."

He inclined his head in acknowledgement before leaving her. _The need was mutual, Clarice. Were I to admit as much, however, I fear I would find it impossible to walk away._

* * *

><p>"Starling, I want you to know that you can still come to me anytime – for whatever you need." Jack Crawford leaned back in his chair. He projected a relaxed affability, a casualness that seemed slightly forced. "And if you get even a whiff of Hannibal Lecter, you get the hell away from him however you can and you call me. Don't try to take him out yourself."<p>

Clarice sat in the chair in front of Jack's desk. She hadn't waited for an invitation to speak with him; she was no longer the fresh-faced trainee practically running to his office, eager to lap up lessons from the great master. But she was still, on the surface at least, his protégé – and it would have been odd indeed if she hadn't spoken to him personally about her resignation.

And maybe it had been wishful thinking that the conversation wouldn't have taken the turn it had. _You know there's always been… something… there. He was trying to play games with Hannibal; he probably thought he'd finally bested him by dangling me as bait. _

_Mmm. I must admit, I am quite hooked, my dear._

She hid her smile with pursed lips, a screen of thoughtful consideration. _Behave._

"You still think he'll come after me? It's been more than a year now, sir." _Or, you know, less than seventy-two hours since he loaded my groceries into my car for me. Maybe we'll just keep that to ourselves, though._

"He's a patient, crafty sonovabitch, Starling." Well, she couldn't disagree with the first two. Though, were circumstances different, she allowed, she might take offense on his mother's behalf at the third. She could hardly punch Jack Crawford in the face in his own office and force him to take it back. "I can't offer you formal protection without a defined threat, but you watch yourself."

"Of course, sir. But I think I was just a passing fancy for him – a way to pass the time and keep his mind sharp while he looked for another opportunity to escape." On some level, that was even true, she thought; it simply wasn't the _entire_ truth.

There was something in Jack's face, some thought that had hit him like a blow while she spoke. The muscles in his jaw tightened, and he looked away before he responded.

"I doubt you're a passing fancy for any man, Cl- Starling." He slapped a hand lightly on his desk. "So, what are you planning to do with your newfound freedom?"

This was no time to consider his meaning with any depth, so she pushed the disturbing oh-my-god to the back of her mind and answered his question instead.

"I don't know, sir. A vacation first, maybe; some time to put myself back together." A vacation with Hannibal, she thought, and carefully kept the joy off her face.

"That's good, Starling. You deserve some time." He shifted, his posture more open to her. "And after that? You're sure you won't want to come back here?"

She shook her head, calling up a mask of sorrow and determination.

"I can't, sir. I just… I can't. I thought maybe… maybe teaching."

His eyes lightened; he smiled encouragingly at her.

_Yes, that appeals to your patriarchal instincts, doesn't it? Hannibal was right – you would never have accepted me. You would have coddled me, kept me a cub, declawed, for your amusement. _

"That sounds like a fine idea… Clarice. You'd make a good teacher."

She nodded, accepting, as though his opinion still mattered to her. As though it were fine that he called her by her first name and apparently harbored some less-than-avuncular notions about their relationship.

"And I need to be somewhere I can feel safe." He would like that, she was sure. She did not say that "somewhere" was in Hannibal Lecter's embrace. The very idea would have given Uncle Jack a heart attack at his desk. Though she was starting to like that notion. _Maybe someday._

"I'm sorry that that couldn't be here, Clarice, but I think you're making the right choice."

"Thank you, sir." She couldn't entirely keep the smile off her face at the irony, but with the proper twist, it would simply seem to be an attempt at keeping up appearances. "I think so, too. It almost took me too long to realize it, but I don't belong here. I've had too many brushes with death in this job to think that I can keep doing it."

_Not anymore. I belong with Hannibal now. The man has the patience of a saint._

* * *

><p>The closer he came to the day Clarice would finally join him, the more difficulty Hannibal Lecter had with self-restraint. She tested his limits, strained his patience in ways no other could or would.<p>

The existence of a firm date did not diminish his desire; seeing her at the store had not calmed his thoughts. Or, rather, he had been calm in her presence. Reassured. But now, away from her - _two weeks, no more than that_ - he once again found himself laboring to suppress this addiction.

Her very existence disrupted his. Had he not fallen victim to this... _love_... for her, had her well-being not become so integral to his own, he might have found it necessary to end her life, if only so that he might function again. So that he might reclaim his self-possession, his control over his thoughts, his emotionally neutral veneer.

But fallen he had. And if her heart ceased to beat, surely his would as well, for the two were inextricably linked.

He could accomplish necessary tasks; his self-discipline was enough for that, at least. But in his leisure, his thoughts continually returned to her. Did her thoughts complete the reciprocal action?

That, he expected, was the trouble. He did not know. He believed so. He hoped so. But he did not _know_ so. He could not interpret her emotional states when she was not present to be interpreted. He could not guarantee her devotion to him. He could not be certain that fate would not conspire to keep her from him, as it had stolen Mischa. But Mischa had not chosen to leave him. Clarice Starling could.

And that... _fear_... lay like a shadow over his love for her. Only her presence could banish that shade.

So when he boarded his flight to Paris on the night before her own departure, he did so with a worrisome thought that refused to be silenced: What if she never came at all?


	21. Chapter 21

Clarice's final two weeks with the FBI crept by like a never-ending stakeout in the back of a cold van after the coffee had run out.

When she wasn't transcribing surveillance tapes or researching old files to help senior agents add context and perspective to their current cases, she was fielding concerned queries and mother-henning from Ardelia over what she was going to do with her stuff.

Or, rather, what Delia thought she _shouldn't_ be doing with her stuff.

"You seriously want to sell your car? What if you decide you don't like traveling and you want to come back in, like, three weeks or something? You won't have a place to stay or a job or a car. That's crazy, Cee."

The answer that she couldn't give – _hell no, I won't be back in three weeks; I won't be back at all _ – lay on the tip of her tongue. She swallowed it back.

"OK, OK, Dee, you're right - I'll store the car. I'll just pile the junk I'm keeping inside and leave it at a storage place."

That wasn't a bad idea, actually; there were a few things, after all, that she wasn't quite sure what to do with. Like the gifts. They weren't like the furniture; that, cheap and impersonal, she could leave for the next tenant. They weren't like her clothes; most of those would go to Goodwill. If she knew one thing about Hannibal Lecter, it was that he wouldn't have any qualms about draping her body in piles and piles of new clothing. Which was fine, really, because she had never had the patience for shopping.

The violin required a bit more thought, because she _wanted_ it with her – but taking it on the plane would make her stand out. Make her an odd traveler that people remembered. And she wasn't likely to need it anyway; it was a standard student violin, easily replaced. Hannibal had supplied a better one for her in Saarbrucken; he would no doubt do so again.

She frowned. They would have to talk about that – about finances. Thus far, he had provided everything. She had paid only for her plane tickets, and she suspected that he would have preferred to do that as well. She wasn't well-off, by any means, but she was no longer some poor relation in need of charity, looking to be taken in because she had nowhere else to go. She had some money set aside from work, and she could find a job wherever they settled down, couldn't she? She was hardly about to live off of his largesse for the rest of her life.

"You don't have to do that, Cee. You know you could leave your stuff in the house. I've got that spare bedroom I hardly ever need."

Right. Except for the gifts and his letters. It wouldn't feel… _right_, to leave them in Ardelia's hands. And she didn't want to turn them over to Jack Crawford, which, she supposed, was what he and Dee both might expect her to do. Not because she cared if they saw them – Behavioral Science already had copies filed away in the Lecter evidence boxes. No, it was because there were things she wanted to take with her, and she didn't want them to notice the missing items. And Jack would, she knew; he would realize it instantly. The pearls. The puzzle box. The lingerie. The rest of it… she really wanted to pack it all up and wave it in Jack's face. Smash the damn glass in front of him and take the knife with her. But it would only be satisfying for a few moments – the few moments before he would ask if she was going gadding about the world to chase after Hannibal Lecter, and whether she was doing so to catch him or stay with him.

"Dee, we talked about this. I don't know when I'll feel like coming back. It's not fair to you to have to carry my half of the payments, and it wouldn't be fair to you or a new roommate to have to put up with my stuff sitting around. And it's not fair to me, either. I need to make this... a fresh start."

"I know… I guess I just don't want to believe it, you know? We've been roomies for more than three years, if you count the academy. And now you're… going away. Becoming somebody else. I'm gonna miss this."

"You're gonna miss having somebody to kick your ass out of bed at six a.m. on a Saturday and force you to run for miles before you even get to have a coffee?"

Clarice bumped Ardelia with her shoulder. They had been friends, once. Might have been friends still, if she could trust Dee with her secrets. But she couldn't risk Hannibal that way – couldn't share what he meant to her. And Dee wouldn't have understood, anyway. It had taken Clarice herself years to accept that she could, and did, love him. And she still hadn't told him. Hadn't spoken the words aloud, not even to herself. So how could she possibly expect Dee to understand? She couldn't. It was that simple. Nothing could bridge that gap in their friendship now.

"Yeah, jackass. I'm even gonna miss that." Ardelia slung her arms around her in a tight embrace, and Clarice allowed it, returned it, even, because it was expected. And maybe, just a bit, because she knew it was unlikely she'd find a new female friend to take Dee's place.

From now on, it would be just her and Hannibal. Everyone else would be outside the bubble, seeing only the surface reflections, the false identities they projected to preserve their freedom. She wallowed in the loneliness for a moment, soaking up Ardelia's uncomplicated warmth, before recalling that she had never, not once, felt lonely when Hannibal Lecter looked at her. Because he truly _saw_ her, all of her. And really, when she had that, wasn't everything else just… superfluous?

In the end, she let Dee load up the car, all but the gifts locked safely in the trunk, since she was still restricted from carrying more than fifteen pounds at a time. Dee followed in her own car as Clarice stopped at Goodwill and dropped most of her clothes in the donation bin. Then it was on to the storage yard, where she paid for six months in advance, backed the car into the little garage, and padlocked the door. Dee drove them home. It was Saturday, December 18, and by the same time tomorrow she would be airborne, crossing the Atlantic, looking forward to the moment Hannibal Lecter enfolded her in his arms. Then, she knew, she would truly be home.

She spent the evening with Ardelia, who insisted on treating them both to a night out. It wasn't hard, pretending to be her old self, laughing and sharing stories and making up ridiculous nonsense about the people at the tables around them; it was like an old bathrobe she could slip on – comfortable, but boring. And when her distraction got the better of her, enough that even Ardelia noticed, it was easy to pass it off as jitters, nervous excitement for the new adventure she would be starting the next day.

Her sleep was uneasy; too much eagerness coursed through her for true rest. She dozed lightly and woke repeatedly throughout the night, each time turning her face to the alarm clock, continually disappointed to discover it was not nearly time yet. Finally, as dawn neared, she closed her eyes, curled her body around her pillow, and sought out the help she needed.

_Talk to me, Hannibal. _

_Of course, Clarice. What would you have me say? Shall I tell you of your beauty? Your courage? The certainty that we shall be together in merely a day?_

_A day too long, Hannibal. I don't want to waste any more time. _

_Your dreams are not wasted time, Clarice, if you put them to good use, hmm? You do keep placing us on this soft blanket in a lovely meadow. Might we not find something other than lunch to occupy our time here?_

When next she woke, the clock showed nearly noon. And she happily conceded that not a moment had been wasted. She showered and dressed, humming all the while, and went through her rooms for any stray items she had missed. Certain all was well, she carried her bag out to the hall table and headed into the kitchen.

"We have nothing for lunch," Dee announced. "We gotta go out, unless you want questionable milk on stale cereal."

Clarice wrinkled her nose.

"I'll pass, thanks. You pick a place. My treat."

They put on their coats, and Clarice picked up her bag. They could go straight to the airport from lunch; her flight would be leaving at four, and international flights always wanted passengers to arrive early.

"That's all you're taking?" Dee's face held an incredulous expression to match her tone.

"Yup. Only what I can carry." Clarice patted her injured side teasingly and looked down at her bag. A few of Hannibal's gifts, carefully laid at the bottom; some old photos from her childhood she wasn't willing to leave behind; basic toiletries and two complete changes of clothes in case their wires had gotten crossed and she needed to wait for him. Less than fifteen pounds, altogether. The sum total of her life so far. "And right now, that's not much."

* * *

><p>Hannibal Lecter arrived in Paris on a brisk Sunday morning beneath an overcast sky. It was not yet dawn in Washington; Clarice likely still slept as he tasted the distinctive Parisian air. He dined on a late brunch before checking in at his hotel. As it was a bit cold for a walk, and shopping was nearly unheard-of in Paris on a Sunday, he took himself off to the Louvre for the afternoon to explore the expanded exhibition space. He returned to the hotel for dinner, after which he forced himself to sleep early so that he might be fresh in the morning for Clarice's arrival.<p>

A bit of playing the absentminded and overly worried paramour, combined with a sympathetic receptionist in the airline's first-class lounge, had ensured he knew Clarice's flight number and arrival time – just after 6 a.m. Monday – and that the lounge would happily hold a message or a package for her.

Thus he had handed over the small bag he had tucked inside his traveling carryon and ensured that a courtesy call would summon her to the desk to retrieve it once her flight had arrived. It was not _necessary_, no, but it was a reasonable precaution and an excuse to provide for her. In the unlikely event that her departure had been flagged suspicious, a change of clothes to accompany her new persona would not go amiss.

And once she had arrived….

A flight would deposit them in Bern more quickly, but that might not be for the best. Clarice would likely require time to acclimate herself to her new situation. Another journey by airplane, this time by his side, with both of them sporting new identities... no. They would have no privacy. She would not be free to allow her true emotional responses out to play, and had she not just spent two months covering up any semblance of true feeling? He wanted her free to be herself.

But he did not wish to leave her room to run from any reservations she had about her choice. The sooner she could confront any lingering doubt, the better. Which meant that a train ride, though perhaps preferable to him because it would allow him to study her as they traveled, was also contraindicated. He would not play musical chairs with her if she desired space.

No, they would travel to Bern by car, in the Bentley Continental he - or, rather, Edmund Frei - had paid to have delivered to his hotel in Paris for just that purpose. He had made the arrangements well in advance, though Clarice would not know that. She would not, in fact, arrive knowing even the barest information about her future – not even his current alias. She was, on the strength of her faith in him alone, flying to another country with the entirety of her worldly goods in hand.

Her trust – such an unaccustomed emotion for him – still had the power to astonish. Would she take this leap for any other? He thought not. Assuming, of course, she still intended to do so. His warrior might yet choose to concede the field.

The turmoil the thought caused him was not evident as he walked the concourse not long after five o'clock Monday morning. He was not near Clarice's gate, though he watched the arrivals board in the event that the flight's on-time status should change. He would not approach her until after she had received his gifts.

It would not be long now. An hour, perhaps. And then he would know if Clarice Starling had chosen to marry her future to his.


	22. Chapter 22

The customs process moved slowly but steadily, much as Clarice remembered it. Her passport, with its French arrival stamp from six months ago, prompted the customs agent to suggest she might have fallen in love with the country.

"Peut-etre un peu," she admitted. It was hard not to love a place that brought her to Hannibal. She answered the standard questions – a vacation, not planning to stay long, nothing to declare – and passed through without delay.

She didn't see or sense the doctor's presence. They hadn't made specific plans, true, but it was still something of a disappointment not to find him waiting for her, all polite smiles and gentlemanly mannerisms. And then she heard her name on the public address system and had to laugh. The message repeated in French and English.

In June, she had found a letter and a train ticket waiting for her. She wondered what she might find now, if he intended to lead her on a merry chase across the continent. He would probably find it amusing. But his desire for _her _was greater than his desire for amusement, wasn't it? She knew, beyond doubt, that he loved her. She was not simply another amusement for him.

And the bag he had left definitely held more than a letter and a train ticket. Clarice accepted the small duffel and thanked the woman behind the desk.

She carried the bag into a nearby restroom for a bit of privacy before unzipping it. An envelope wrapped in a scarf sat on top; below them lay a blouse, and slacks, and shoes. He'd even included undergarments. She opened the envelope to find a single sheet of paper. No passport. No tickets.

Her heartbeat jumped even before she unfolded his letter.

_He's here. He must be. He'll have my new papers with him._

**Dearest Clarice, **

**As you have undoubtedly surmised by now, I am waiting here for you, amata mia. We stand but moments from the beginning of a new life together. I confess, the thought fills me with anticipation.**

_Me too, Hannibal. _

**We have a journey together ahead of us, Clarice; I have enclosed appropriately comfortable dress, should it prove acceptable to you. **

_A security precaution, too, I'll bet. Clarice Starling walks in, another woman entirely walks out._

She had worn her hair pulled back on the plane; she pulled out the tie as she read, already planning to brush it forward and use the scarf as though she feared it would rain. Together, they would serve to disguise the shape of her face well enough, if she kept her head down.

**When you're ready, perhaps you would care to peruse the shops as you walk toward the main terminal? I'll find you before too long, my dear.**

**Affectionately yours,**

**Hannibal**

Clarice changed quickly, listening for other voices and waiting until the washroom was silent before emerging in her new clothes. She transferred the contents of her old carryon to the new bag, stuffed the clothes she had been wearing into the old bag, and dropped it in the trash bin sans identifying tags. Her coat - the one Hannibal had given her in Omaha - she rolled and forced into the new bag. Carrying it would make for an obvious marker on security footage.

She studied herself critically in the mirror. In her new clothes, with her hair framing her face and a scarf over the top, carrying her new bag, she little resembled the woman who had walked in. It would do, for a cursory inspection. Not that she expected pursuit, but it would be wise to be cautious. That was something she would have to practice, she supposed - a heightened awareness of potential dangers. It was a natural state of being for Hannibal, but she couldn't expect him to carry her weight, to pay for her mistakes.

They were partners, now. And unlike with her partners at the Bureau, she was already in sync with him. When they flowed together, their edges slipped into place perfectly. For now, he would make up for her lesser experience. But she was determined to have his back as he had hers.

She smiled.

"Time for some window-shopping, I think."

* * *

><p>Hannibal was loitering near an arrivals board, his back turned to the concourse, when Clarice emerged from a nearby lavatory. He did not give any indication that he had noticed her. She moved in the opposite direction, heading toward the shops to his left. He remained in place, his eyes tracking her peripherally as he pretended to scan the boards for a flight.<p>

Once several minutes had passed and no one appeared to be following her, he began his own walk toward the shops. Despite the early hour, the crowd was fairly thick as travelers jaunted to and fro for their Christmas holidays, and the stores, sensing easy prey, were open and welcoming.

Losing Clarice in the crowd, however, was not a concern; the headscarf he had given her was a deep aubergine threaded through with trailing vines of ivy in antique brass. As she had chosen to wear it, he had no trouble locating her at any moment.

When she stepped into one of the higher-end clothing stores, a place with a steady stream of gawkers and browsers but few true shoppers, he closed the distance between them. She browsed at a rack of dresses. Whether she realized it or not, her current clothing marked her to the sales personnel as a potential buyer. One who could afford the prices, at any rate. He discreetly waved off an approaching clerk as he navigated the displays toward her.

"There you are, my dear." He moved in close from behind her, off to the left, but did not move to touch her, trusting her to recognize his voice. As amusing as it would be to startle her as he had at the grocers – to make her composure slip, just for an instant – he hardly wanted her to call out his name in the airport. "Is there anything you desire before we depart?"

She turned with calm dignity, studying him in the same way she had upon their meeting at the Hauptbahnhof, the central train station in Saarbrucken. No, not entirely the same, he amended; there was something deeper in her eyes, and she wasn't blushing under his tender regard.

She raised her left hand to his face and ran her thumb along his cheekbone. The pleasure he took in her touch was only heightened by the fact that _she_ had initiated the action, unprompted and without seeking permission to do so. It seemed she felt… _entitled_ to touch him.

"Just you," she murmured, pulling him gently forward and pressing her lips to his, lightly at first and then more firmly. Her eyes sparkled with joy and a hint of mischief when she pulled away. "I'm _very_ happy to see you."

Her kiss hadn't been seductive in the least; it had been… pleased… and full of promise. And although she had pulled her head back far enough to look him in the eyes, she was making no attempt to put more space between them. His left hand had instinctively gone to her waist when she had stepped into his personal space, and it lay there still, fingers gently stroking along the lower edge of her latissimus dorsi. Were he to stroke upward few inches, he expected he might feel the raised edges of the scarring from her knife wound through her blouse.

"I suppose I needn't ask if you missed me, my dear."

Her hand dropped from his face to his chest, her fingers moving as though to adjust his tie, but as she smoothed it toward the vee of his suit coat, her hand stopped to lay flat against his chest, protectively nestling over his heart.

"Nope, you don't have to ask," she agreed, in good humor. "And neither do I."

She kissed him again, then, this time with more amorous intent, he judged. She pulled away more slowly, raising her eyebrow at him. Her voice dropped to a quieter register.

"Am I scandalizing you by molesting you in public, Doctor?"

He smiled, affectionately, and leaned in to brush his mouth over her ear.

"So long as we don't draw unwanted attention, Clarice, you may molest me anywhere you like."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"See that you do."

They broke apart, then, and she naturally took his arm, just as he collected her small bag.

* * *

><p>Clarice settled deeper into the plush leather of the passenger seat. They were heading out of Paris now; she had expected that, of course, as any effort on Delia's part to contact her would start there. Better to not be there at all, to start her life as Caroline Bell somewhere far from Clarice Starling's last flight.<p>

"So are you going to tell me where we're headed?"

"Is the knowledge imperative to your sense of well-being, Clarice?"

She considered for a moment. Did it matter where he was taking her? Wherever it was, _he_ would be there also - so in some ways the destination itself was irrelevant.

"Just curious. And I thought you telling me about the myriad wonders of this mythical place would pass the time." She wiped all expression from her face to keep her smirk from showing, and continued. "But if you'd rather play Slug Bug, that's fine with me. I won't punch you too hard."

"'Slug Bug'? I shudder to ask."

"If you're the first one to see a VW Beetle, you call it out and punch the other person. And no punch-backs. That's just rude."

"And this was how you amused yourself while traveling? American children seem to be quite a violent lot, Clarice."

"Well … it _is _still dark, for another hour at least, right? You'd like padiddle better, I think."

He tipped his head toward hers, briefly, and raised a questioning brow.

"'Padiddle,' you say? I hardly think that's a word, Clarice."

She pressed her lips together to hold back a laugh before responding.

"It is if you're an American teen or twentysomething - which, technically, I guess I still am - and you're looking for an excuse to make out with a boy in your car - which, again, technically, I suppose I could be."

She noted a longer pause as he processed _that_ idea.

"And such activities require the cover of darkness, do they? By all means, explain this padiddle of yours."

"You have to look for the cars with one headlight out. When kids play, they call out padiddle and touch the roof. When kids who've just gotten their driver's licenses play, they invite as many cute members of the opposite sex along as they can cram in the car, and either the person calling out the padiddle first is owed a kiss from everyone else in the car or everyone else has to remove an item of clothing and leave it off for the rest of the drive."

His fingers shifted their grip on the steering wheel despite the straight nature of the road ahead.

"This game is an excuse to give in to raging hormones, then."

"Oh yeah."

"And you wish to play with me."

"You're the one who didn't want to talk about where we're going. We could have had a nice, safe conversation about that instead."

"Mmm. I think you're playing with me now, Clarice."

She smiled and stretched. He wasn't wrong about that.

"Which I wouldn't do if I didn't feel safe, and comfortable, and happy to be here. Is that something you wanna complain about?"

"Most assuredly not, my dear."

She laughed as a thought came to her – one he might appreciate as well, she supposed. And she had no idea how long they would be entertaining each other in the car, so why not share?

"I spent the last week figuring out what to do with my stuff: what to keep, what to sell, what to store – that sort of thing."

"I noted you didn't bring much with you, Clarice. You must have pruned your belongings quite thoroughly."

His voice held neither judgment nor teasing, and she wondered what conclusions he had drawn from her tiny traveling bag.

"When I started going through things, I realized there wasn't really much I needed. It didn't … _mean_ … anything. It was just stuff. I ended up having to store more than I cared about, just to stop Delia from being suspicious. She kept offering to let me store it at the house, in case I decided I'd made a mistake and wanted to go running back."

She saw the slightest tilt of his head, the barest tightening in his cheek. He didn't actually think that, did he? Hannibal Lecter did not doubt himself, she knew, but that didn't mean he might not doubt _her_. She pushed the thought aside to think over later.

"Which, of course, is never gonna happen, but I couldn't tell Dee that. And I wasn't about to leave your letters and gifts boxed up where she could poke through them. But I was tempted – so tempted – to bring that knife with me."

She was watching him closely; his eyes, darting in her direction, didn't disappoint. Yeah, she'd gotten his attention with that statement.

"Oh?"

"I didn't think it would have gone over well with airport security, even in the glass."

"No, likely not. Is it destined to remain in Virginia, then, Clarice? Forever tucked inside its glass bed?"

She didn't have to ask if he was talking about the knife anymore; they both knew he wasn't. _Stick with me a minute, Hannibal. I think you'll like this one._

"See, that's the thing. I wanted to bring it so I could send it back."

She waited. She couldn't _see _him thinking, but she knew it wouldn't take much for him to piece it together. He had a sixth sense about such things.

"Not to Ardelia," he commented. "She has been your friend as best as she's been able, and I've not known you to be deliberately cruel. A message to Uncle Jack, perhaps?"

She nodded, smiling, watching the countryside rolling toward them as he sped up to pass another car.

"I had to tell him about my resignation in person – it would've looked odd if I hadn't – an' all I could think about was how bad I wanted to smash that damn glass an' send him the shards with a thank-you note for every time he tried to hold me back or demonstrated how unjust the FBI really is. He helped me see what I really wanted – what I had waiting for me in you. That I could never be _me _there, as much as I wanted to pretend I could." Her grin stretched across her face now, and she didn't bother to contain it. "The shards, and the knife, and a nice little note thanking him for plucking me out of class and sending me to your door."

He was silent for so long that she finally had to turn and look at him, her smile dimming just a bit as she wondered if she had offended him in some way. But no – there it was, the hint of a smile on his face as well. He took his eyes from the road long enough to capture hers, and she saw the amusement sparking in them.

"What a lovely thought, Clarice." When he spoke again, his voice held a note of eager enticement. "I could easily obtain another such paperweight. And we are so near to Christmas now – why, it would be a shame if we didn't send Uncle Jack a token of our gratitude."

He was teasing, she thought. Probably. Maybe. But then why were his fingers tapping thoughtfully on the steering wheel? She laughed.

"No, Hannibal, if I can't do it, you can't either. I did not sit through weeks of ridiculous psychological counseling and leave quietly to avoid suspicion just so you could blow the game for a chance to rub Jack's nose in it."

He gracefully changed the subject, then, to the delights of her so-called counseling sessions, drawing the details from her with perceptive, playful questioning – but she thought, from the glow in his eyes, that he hadn't really given up on the idea. He was just deferring it until later. Well, that was fine. Eventually, she supposed, they might both want to add some excitement to their life together. _There's always next year._


	23. Chapter 23

She had called him _Hannibal_.

Naturally, without pause, with laughter in her voice, she had called him by name. And she had shared such delightful thoughts… as though she were determined to help him recapture every moment they had spent apart. His patience had been thoroughly rewarded with the generosity of spirit that only Clarice Starling seemed to possess in his presence.

Their journey had taken nearly eight hours, including a stop for brunch in Dijon, and at no point had she seemed awkward or uncomfortable – with him or with her choices. Perhaps it would take longer, he thought; their first days in Saarbrucken had been promising as well. Her doubts had not surfaced until later. He was prepared to wait, if necessary. He'd had quite a bit of practice, had he not? He would not impose expectations upon her; there was nothing she need do to stay with him but be fully herself.

By mid-afternoon, they had crossed into Switzerland, Clarice speaking quite passable French at the border. He pulled into the drive of the little vacation home outside Bern at half-past three and cut the engine.

Their conversation had drifted into comfortable silence once he had left the highway for the local roads, Clarice likely perceiving that their destination lay nearby. Her body relayed her excitement to him – the increase in adrenaline, the slight tension in her frame, the way her eyes eagerly devoured the view through the windshield.

"We're home?"

Her voice was soft but hopeful as well, he thought.

"For a few months at least, Clarice, if you find the chalet pleasing. If not, I'll make other arrangements."

He stepped out of the car and came around to assist her, a courtesy she allowed without comment. He left the bags for now; he was, he admitted, eager to see her reaction to the house. He had engaged the housekeeper to make certain all was ready for their arrival: fresh food in the refrigerator, fresh sheets on the beds, fresh flowers for color throughout the house.

Upon unlocking the door, he gestured her in ahead of him. Her shoes clicked against the hardwood floor. Nordic ash, pale and inviting. She turned in place, surveying the first floor. The open floor plan made a single room of it, the piano and fireplace dominating the front half of the room as the breakfast bar's marble countertop did the back half.

It was not overly large, just 1,200 square feet on the first floor, perhaps twice as long as it was wide, but overwhelming her with opulence was not his intent. He had wanted something she would find cozy, _domestic_, rather than intimidating. Something that invited her presence in the kitchen, should she wish to watch or participate in meal preparation.

And yet he had also made certain she would have a separate room upstairs, a space of her own in the event she needed an escape. He himself, quite accustomed to creating solitude in his mental landscape as necessary, had no need for an escape. Her presence, whether calm or agitated, was always welcome.

She made some small sound, a note of approval, he judged, and then she gasped. Ah. She had looked up, past the kitchen, and she headed with some speed now toward the back of the house, a veritable wall of windows with the doors leading out to the lower terrace.

She stood and stared at the view from nearly the exact spot as he had when making the decision to select the home. The back of the house faced south. Rising majestically above the pine trees were the snow-capped Swiss Alps – the Bernese Oberland, to be precise. He followed her more sedately, pausing a polite distance behind her. Without turning, she stretched out an arm; when he laid a hand in hers, she pulled him forward and wrapped his arm about her waist, covering it with her own.

"It's beautiful," she murmured. "You knew I'd love the mountains."

He hummed softly in agreement. He had anticipated the sight would feel familiar for her, steeper perhaps than the Appalachians and Rockies she would have been accustomed to in her youth, but no less welcome.

"Thank you, Hannibal."

To his way of thinking, he ought to be thanking her; she stood comfortably in his embrace, his hand splayed against her stomach, the scent of her hair in his nose.

"It was no trouble, Clarice. It pleases me that you find the view favorable."

"It fits." She shrugged lightly against him. "Snug, but open, too – the house and the view."

"If you'd care to explore upstairs, Clarice, I'll be just a moment retrieving our bags." He paused, recalling her behavior in Saarbrucken, the division between them, the stairs to the third floor that she had not once set foot upon. "There are no doors closed to you in this house."

She stood slightly straighter at his words, her spine lengthening; she squeezed his hand briefly before letting him go.

"Sure, I can do that." Her voice took on a playful, teasing tone, a faux society air, as she reached the stairs and turned back to look at him. "Go on, then, fetch the bags and be quick about it."

He gave a slight bow, keeping his eyes on her face, watching her lips twitch in amusement.

"As you wish, madam."

* * *

><p>The stairs stood near the front corner of the house, turning back at the midpoint to create an almost square pillar rather than heading up in an unbroken line. The door underneath proved to hide a small half-bath for the first floor. Clarice approved of the efficient use of space. She expected Hannibal did as well.<p>

The stairs were hardwood, like the first floor, and her steps echoed lightly in the space. Three open doors greeted her, all leading off the small sitting area at the top of the stairs – a small leather armchair in a deep brown, the sort with antique brass tacks studded around the edges, and a side table beneath an east-facing window through which she could see only more trees.

This home was secluded, set far back from its neighbors. She wondered if he had chosen the townhouse in Saarbrucken, with its shared walls, to reassure her that he had no plans to carry her off to some isolated spot and kill her where there would be no one to hear her screams. And now he recognized that she needed no such reassurance, because she _knew_. It wasn't a question she had to ask.

And, really, if there were to be screaming now…. Her face warmed. Well, it wasn't the sort of thing she'd want the neighbors interrupting, now was it?

Two doors lay to her right; she passed them for the moment, more interested in the one that lay straight ahead. It was the larger bedroom, clearly, running across the back of the house. And it had a balcony, the same view as from the kitchen, only from a greater height. As though she stood on the tops of the trees.

The décor was neutral, a touch masculine perhaps; she stood in his bedroom. _No – __**our **__bedroom._ If there were to be no closed doors between them, then this, too, was her domain as much as his. She peeked in the attached bath, with its generous shower stall and oversized tub, and quickly stepped out again.

_Relax. You've been here all of twenty minutes, and he's been driving all day. Get your hormones under control. _

She left the master bedroom, bypassing the door in the hall that led to a smaller bathroom, and stepped through the remaining door. A guest bedroom. Well-appointed, vaguely feminine… did its presence mean he didn't want her in the master bedroom? No… he did, didn't he? She had thought… but maybe…. _Stop second-guessing yourself. It's courtesy, that's all. He wouldn't presume._

The thought dissipated her stress instantly. Of course he would give her the choice, no matter how he felt about things. Well, then, she wouldn't presume either. At least, not just yet.

His voice came from behind her.

"Shall I leave your bag in here, Clarice? The room is yours, in the event that you wish a place entirely your own, my dear."

She nodded without turning.

"For now, yeah. That would be good."

She listened to his steps as he crossed to the bed beside her and set her small bag on the cedar chest at the end.

"I had thought to prepare an early dinner, if that suits, Clarice."

Her heart beat faster at his nearness; she expected he could sense it.

"Sure, I'd like that."

"You're welcome to join me in the kitchen, my dear."

Watch him in the kitchen? Help him, maybe, with his quiet voice and his firm hands and… Jesus. Join him in the kitchen, right. While she was trying her damnedest not to just throw him down on the bed in front of them?

"I think I might take a nap. Let dinner be a surprise instead of me hovering while you work."

"Of course, Clarice. You've had a long night and day of traveling. Come downstairs whenever you're ready, my dear."

He left without touching her, as courteous as ever. She kicked off her shoes and lay down on the bed, not bothering with the quilt. Her eyes drifted closed, eliminating distractions, as she pondered a single question: Did she have the courage, finally, to offer herself without reservation, without fear of rejection, weighing his needs and her own? Tonight?


	24. Chapter 24

She had come down to dinner freshly showered and dressed; he had taken the time to do so himself after completing their basic meal preparation. He expected it had been the scent of the pheasant coming out of the oven that had woken her. He had let it rest as she showered, waiting to begin carving until he heard her descending the stairs. He seated her at the table, leaving the lights low; full darkness had fallen outside an hour past. It was just after seven o'clock, early yet, but the depth of winter made the hour feel later.

They spoke quietly over the meal, on light subjects, the preparation of the dishes, the local attractions they might visit during their stay. He did not raise questions regarding the status of their relationship or her intentions. In those matters, she must be the guide. Already she had consented to leave her life behind; he would not pressure her for more.

For dessert, he served pears in maple sauce, with fresh whipped cream and toasted walnuts as garnish. Clarice seemed to savor the sweetness; the look on her face was so wanton in its enjoyment of the dish that he could not help but consider the possibilities of a maple-drenched Clarice, though he expected she would need no such adornment to be equally delectable.

He was not surprised when she surveyed their empty plates and suggested they clean up together. Dishwashing was a ritual he might come to embrace with joy if it meant more time spent alongside a perfectly contented Clarice Starling.

They shifted to the front room afterward, a comfortable familiarity in their movements as he seated himself at the piano and she joined him. The suggestion that she take up the violin waiting for her was met with a small shake of her head.

"I haven't been able to play in weeks; I don't even want to think about what I'd sound like tonight. I'd rather just listen to you play, if you don't mind being the only entertainer on the bill."

He did not, of course, though he would be certain in the days to come to provide time when she might be alone to practice her supposedly rusty skills if she would not do so when he remained within earshot.

It was perhaps an hour later when she stood and excused herself to prepare for bed. He paused in his playing long enough to listen to her footsteps overhead, to the sounds that revealed her destination.

The guest room.

He found his fingers traveling across the keys once more, picking out Mahler's "Adagietto," a melancholic lament suited to his disappointment. Even had she wished only for chaste closeness, he would have gladly obliged. Would have lain beside her as he had in the crowded train berth, needing only the knowledge of her nearness, the scent of her skin, to soothe him.

The sound of his playing must have masked her footfalls on the stairs; her scent was quite close before he realized it was more than a lingering echo. She had returned to him.

He lifted his hands from the keys, then, and stood to greet her. Perhaps she had forgotten something, or needed something but was unsure of its location. He turned. His questions died in his throat.

At her neck, she wore the pearls he had given her. And on her body... on her body, she wore the blue silk nightgown he had long ago gifted her as a valentine.

Her gaze was direct, one eyebrow arched; her smile was small but unmistakably full of invitation. Only the slight twitching of her feet in the matching slippers communicated her anxiety as she waited for his response.

He recalled, without prompting, the shy hesitance in her voice as she had spoken to him so enticingly over dinner six months ago. Such a charming confession as she told him of her desire. His eyes burned into her.

"I see you, Clarice," he murmured. "The sight is deserving of my most thorough, sincere appreciation."

Her smile grew, and she stretched out a hand to him.

"Come to bed, Hannibal."

He needed no further encouragement, moving swiftly to her and clasping her hand in his own. Her left hand, he noted; her right arm still tired easily, lacking the support it had previously enjoyed from the healthy, toned musculature of her back and side. Her needs would dictate the pace of this encounter, though certainly she was not shy now in leading him up the stairs.

Her scent was full of arousal, free of any trace of fear or shame or anger. They passed the open door to her room without pausing, and he sensed she would have no need of it – not tonight and not on future nights, either. Once in his bed, she meant to stay there.

_Our bed._

Knowledge of her arousal fed his own; his breathing came heavier now, and he did not attempt to hide it. Let her know the full measure of desire she woke in him. His lioness had more than earned what rewards she would take from him; she deserved every scrap of pride and power she felt in so provoking him. He would not diminish her pleasure by denying his own.

She crossed the threshold of his bedroom without stopping, still leading him by the hand. _She does not question her right to be here. Excellent._

Clarice did not reach for the light – a preference for the romanticism of the moonlight filtering through the windows or a concession to the scars she might now be hesitant to show him? He set the thought aside; the moon, past half-full and waxing, was more than sufficient for his own visual needs, and if the latter were an issue, it was one he might handle with repeated and loving attention rather than intrusive questioning.

She stopped at the bedside; he continued his movement toward her until their bodies touched, releasing her hand to slip his arms around her. Her own hands stroked his flanks, digging in with strength and pressing him closer to her. He allowed it, gathering her to him equally tightly with perhaps more care but no less passion, until the softness of her lower abdomen curved around the solidity of his erection and she emitted a pleased moan against his jaw, her face tucked alongside his own.

His hands slid down her back, fingers rippling over the spaghetti straps crisscrossing her skin, plucking the strings lightly as he passed, the strains of Grieg's Op. 5, No. 3, playing in his mind, an accompaniment to the soft murmurs she made as she sprinkled his neck with kisses. He pressed her to him more tightly still, enjoying the expansion of her chest against his own when she breathed deeply, her nose nuzzling below his ear, inhaling his scent. Her hum expressed her approval.

He turned his head to the side and caught her mouth with his own. Her eyes closed; his did not. He watched the minute changes in her face, memorizing the movements of lips and tongue that seemed most pleasing to her, that drew the greatest response. She was eager and quite responsive to him, he noted with pleasure.

Her busy fingers had untucked his shirt and undershirt and now slipped beneath, hands splaying upward against his back. He allowed his own hands to drift downward, over the outward thoracic curve of her spine, beyond the delicate lumbar dip, his fingers kneading her skin in a mirror of her own movements on his. But where her hands moved up to press against his shifting scapulae, his own continued down to cup her buttocks. Her skin, he expected, would be as soft as the silk currently covering it.

His hands, of their own volition, stroked her more firmly, gathering additional fabric with each clasp. His eyes closed, finally; the kiss grew deeper, more heated, as he put his new knowledge to use.

Clarice shifted, and he immediately missed the soft warmth of her body pressed against his own. But her hands skimming down his back and slipping around his waist made her intent clear as she lifted his shirt fully free of his pants and began working on the buttons.

She spread the linen shirt open and pushed up the undershirt, the fabric piling against his arms, and stepped forward once more. The silk of her nightgown dragged enticingly against his bare chest; even through the material, her excitement was obvious, her nipples firm. She gasped, her mouth drawing away from his, when his hands reached the end of the nightgown, bunched now at his wrists, and slid across her bare flesh. Intentional or not, her feet edged outward, opening her to him and bringing a stronger wave of her arousal to his nose.

Her head tipped gently to the side; her eyes drifted open.

"My gown seems to be getting shorter, Hannibal."

He nodded, his eyes intent on hers. The depth of her desire for him was easy to read; she hid nothing from him now.

"Yes, it does seem so. I'm afraid it's about to disappear entirely, my dear." His hands rose, carrying the bunched silk with them, pausing at her waist.

Her feet shuffled again; the rustling they made told him she had shed the matching slippers. She smiled at him.

"I'm not afraid."

Her arms lifted. The flicker in her eyes told him of the slight strain in her abdominal muscles from the motion; he raised the gown swiftly over her head and tossed it aside, clasping her wrists and lowering her arms to his neck. He stroked her from wrists to shoulders and then dropped his hands down her back again, bending his knees just enough to reach the top of her thighs, cup his hands beneath her buttocks, and lift her.

She dug her fingers into his trapezii, leaning her weight into him; he reveled in the press of her inner thighs around his hips. Her muscles clenched as he stepped forward and lowered her to the bed. He followed her down out of necessity, as she had not unwound her arms from his shoulders.

He kissed her, a firm press of closed lips, and gently pulled her arms away, placing softer kisses against her palms as he laid her arms on the bed. He stood and gazed down at her as he stripped off his own clothes. She lay nude in the moonlight, watching him, the lines of her body unbroken by barriers of any kind. No bars, no glass stood between them. No cloth. No fears. She lay open to him, vulnerable, trusting. The sight was carefully stored in his memory.

His heart stuttered in his chest. Medically speaking, of course, he could name every reaction, every hormone surge, every chemical change that was occurring now and those that would occur later, _after_, to enhance his bond with his sexual partner. But emotionally speaking, he had no words to express the profound nature of this moment, to convey to her the mixture of possessive dominance and grateful supplication that drove him now.

_Mine._

He sank to his knees and leaned over her until her thighs cradled his face and the scent of her filled his nose. Her sweetness flowed over his tongue like warm honey. He would gladly have stayed, enjoying the soft sounds she made and the tremors coursing through her, had she not called to him.

"Hannibal… I want… _oh god_… you here with me… _please_… both of us together… now… _Hannibal, please_…."

He growled and felt her shudder. He well understood her impatience, her desire for connection; the same hunger beckoned him, urged him to sate himself with her. He joined her on the bed, lying beside her, pleased when she took the initiative to press him to his back and lie atop him. She kissed him, sweeping her tongue into his mouth, and he knew she must taste her own lingering sweetness there.

Clarice moaned, rubbing against him, rolling her hips, and he fought the desire to still her hips and thrust into her. It seemed she had the same thought. Her legs dropped alongside his own, her knees sliding forward until he felt them nudging at his waist. She broke their kiss, then, and sat perched atop him. The weight and pressure of her centered on his groin teased him with the promise of fulfillment.

She reached for his erection, her hand gripping him firmly as she rose up on her knees above him. Gripping his bare skin.

He touched her thigh, drawing her attention.

"There are condoms in the nightstand, Clarice."

"No need."

"Disease may not be a concern for either of us, Clarice, but an unexpected pregnancy would put undue strain upon your body at this point in your recovery."

"Won't happen." She lowered herself until the tip of his erection slipped between her labia, her wet warmth a clear invitation.

"Clarice." A note of warning, now; he would not play with her health, nor would he allow her to do so. She had not been taking birth control pills, he knew – and even had she been, her hospital stay and antibiotics would have disrupted their effect.

She gasped, shuddering for a moment as her hand manipulated his flesh to run his glans across her clitoris. He fought the reflexive closing of his eyes and thrust of his hips.

"IUD," she murmured, her attention fully focused on the motion of her hand and the slide and press of his flesh against hers. It was, he admitted, a rather… all-consuming sight. "In May. When I decided to place the personal ad."

She sank down then, before he had time to fully process her words, to consider how prepared – expectant – she had been for their joining even before she was certain of the rightness of their desire. Such thoughts were pushed aside, entirely secondary to the complete communion he felt now, buried within her welcoming body as her eyes met his with unadulterated joy.

* * *

><p>A single slow slide gave Clarice the union she sought. Her body had been ready for him, waiting for this, since before they'd even entered the bedroom. The completeness, the fullness, she felt now was both physical and emotional.<p>

Her eyes watched his, a mirror of her joy. She leaned down to touch her lips to his. She ignored the twinge in her side from the stretch; it was nothing, a familiar ache, and she had a host of more important, newer, sensations to explore. She throbbed with pleasure where her body cradled his; she could feel the tension humming in him beneath her.

She had done this. She had put that tenderness in his tongue as it traced her lips; she had put that deep joy in his eyes as he watched her pull back. She had stiffened his desire and put the heat in the blood that so obligingly gave her such pleasure as she rose up on her knees and fell again. His hands rested lightly on her hips, a reassuring warmth that sought only contact, not control, as she rose and fell at a pace of her choosing.

There were no words between them now; they had no need for them.

Clarice set no rhythm at first, testing his responses as she suspected he had been testing hers. Could she make him twitch inside her? Gasp her name? Tense his muscles and thrust upward, seeking her as she pulled away? Yes, to all, she discovered to her delight.

She teased them both from her seat of power, settling into a rhythm and driving them both toward something just out of reach only to change the rhythm and begin again. Now that she finally had him where she wanted him, she saw no reason to let it end so quickly. Orgasm beckoned, but she almost didn't want it to arrive, not yet, when there was such exquisite pleasure and _want_ rushing through her from the anticipation. If she could make that moment on the edge last forever, suspended between need and satisfaction, every cell in her body keenly aware of the driving heat of him, she would gladly stay there with him.

And he made no protest; he did not force her to undulate faster with rough actions, did not display impatience with angry words. He merely watched her with burning eyes as she rose and fell atop him. Watched her consume him, watched her _accept_ him where their bodies joined.

His hands stroked over her flanks as she swayed. She'd found the rolling motion she wanted now, the one that pressed her clit hard against him as she settled fully on every downstroke and swept forward to rise again. She drove herself harder and felt a twinge of sharper pain in her right side, a tightening of muscle that did not belong to the aching pleasure suffusing the rest of her body. She ignored it, wanting to move faster, recognizing the trembling in her overworked thighs that would soon make it impossible for her to remain upright, to lift herself at all.

But on her next downward motion, when the ache in her side from the exertion was beginning to reach a level she thought might make it impossible to concentrate on pleasure, his hands pressed into her spine and pulled her down to him. He kissed her, deeply, as she lay like a blanket across his chest. Distantly she noted the pressure of his hand on her left knee, straightening her leg. He rolled them before she even consciously recognized his intent, but her legs instinctively rose to grip him in this new position.

He thrust, gently, and her back flexed, her hips curving toward him to demand more. His weight lay on his arms on either side of her face; his fingers fluttered teasingly against her cheeks.

"Now, Clarice?" His voice was a quiet rumble, thick with passion. "Has my lioness finished toying with me?"

She nodded, and he rewarded her with a slow, steady, deeper thrust. Her eyes closed; she fought to keep them open.

"I'm yours, Hannibal." She couldn't explain it on a more basic level than that. She only knew that whether he had rolled her beneath him to alleviate the pressure on her healing muscles or to express his own dominance didn't matter to her; it was precisely the place she wanted to be to finish this, to feel the strength of his hips pinning her down and the welcome, protective cage of his arms blocking out the world.

"I know." He grinned at her, a fierce flash of his teeth, and she was laughing with the joy of it all as he drove her to the edge until in sudden and surprising unison, gasping and crying out, they tumbled over together.


	25. Chapter 25

Hannibal Lecter woke without confusion, without a sense of displacement or concern, though the situation was new to his experience. He lay on his back, as he had slept for years, his body trained to stillness, alert to the possibility of danger in this vulnerable state. Such awareness had predated even his years in the twisted care of Frederick Chilton; it was a habit acquired in childhood, in that terrible winter, and he could not now shed it even had he wished to do so.

A chill stole over him, a memory-thought attempting to float into consciousness, but it was easily banished. Not by him, no, but by the warm presence of his companion. She was the new element, the unknown factor that upset the equation in ways brilliant and terrifying.

Clarice lay on her side, her naked back curled against him, the delightful curve of her bottom snug at his hip. It was a pose both trusting and wary, near but not near. He lay quietly for a time, enjoying the press of her body and the steadiness of her breath. She had not slipped into nightmares; it was no movement or utterance of hers that had awakened him.

Her deep slumber pleased him. That he had satisfied her enough to leave her in such a peaceful state pleased him more. For all the sparks that had ignited between them in the nearly three years since their first meeting, sexual compatibility had been an unknown quantity. Tension and desire were not always accurate predictors. Had it been necessary to suppress or redirect his appetites in order to keep her, he would have done so, but he greatly preferred the current openness and honesty between them.

Previous paramours had been nothing more than idle playthings, the healthy release of sexual desire where no deeper feelings existed. He had made certain they were satisfied, but he had not spent his nights with them. They had not known him; they had not been invited to share his dwelling or his bed. Trust and affection had had no place in those encounters. Charm and attentiveness had won him invitations to their beds, and he had not refused what was willingly offered.

Clarice was… different. Unique. He desired her still – again – despite the post-coital lethargy that lingered in his muscles. It was a pleasant, languid sensation that suffused him from head to toe, a warm stirring that had him half-hard and twitching against his thigh.

A simple shift found him on his side, her bare back an empty canvas for his hands. He traced the length of her spine from atlas and axis to sacrum and coccyx with the flat of his palm first. He stilled for a moment, hand pressed to silken skin, but detected no change in her slumber. He smiled.

He made the return trip with his knuckles, the back of his hand bumping lightly along her vertebrae on their way to her neck. No pause at the top; no, his hand simply turned and stroked more swiftly downward with fingertips pressed to her flesh. Clarice slept on.

His hands mapped her slender expanses and their scars with tenderness and care, taking the time he had not been allowed earlier. Her impatience to be joined had been understandable and shared; the preliminaries had not, perhaps, played a large role in her previous experiences. Now and in the future, however… his smile grew as he bent his head and traced the outline of her right scapula with lips and tongue.

Her arm lay along the top of her body, elbow bent to drape her forearm protectively across her stomach. His hand stroked along the humerus, coaxing her arm forward and baring the sweeping curve of her thoracic cage and intercostal muscles to him. He laid his palm flat against her skin just below the concavity of her axilla and followed the outward curve of her ribs downward with steady, even pressure, dipping into the enticing hollow at her waist and the even more enticing iliac crest at her hip.

She made a soft sound as she exhaled; her right leg shifted slightly forward, her knee bending just enough to bring her foot into light contact with his shin. She was not awake, not yet, but her skin had warmed and the scent of fresh arousal was rising.

His hand continued forward, tipping over the iliac crest and down across the softness of her pelvic cavity. He bypassed more direct erogenous triggers in favor of lingering over the slope of her quadriceps – weakened, no doubt, by the limitations on her running routine during her convalescence, but still a firm strength under his hand. His fingers curved inward and down to brush the silky skin of her inner thighs, venturing close but never quite reaching the labia majora.

A slight grumble emerged from her throat, and he soothed her with a quiet hum against her neck. His mouth closed over the rise of her trapezius above her clavicle and sucked in a long, slow, pulsing rhythm. The slope of her bare breasts kept his eyes transfixed; the skin of her areolae flushed and crinkled as her nipples rose under his gaze. Her breathing had grown more pronounced; her breasts danced in time with the rhythm of her respiration.

He allowed her muscles to slip from his mouth and lifted his head slightly, pulling his eyes from her breasts to study her face. Her eyes flickered in rapid movement beneath closed lids. She dreamt. Hopefully of him, of the responses he was even now coaxing from her pliant body.

His own arousal had grown more insistent. He had ignored it until now, though their close proximity meant the occasional twitch brought his sensitive, hyper-alert flesh into contact with her backside and sent a rush of pleasure up his spine. But her body, too, worked against him as much as with him – perhaps sensing his heat, his delectable dreamer wriggled backward and settled squarely in his lap, a pleased sigh falling from her lips.

He gave in to impulse then and pressed himself firmly against her along the full length of her body, his right hand splayed over the curve of her abdomen, his thumb alongside her navel, his fingers dipping toward her pubic arch.

"Hannibal." His name was a sleepy moan on her lips, the same guttural, loving tone he had first heard as she called him back to her bed long before such a reality had been even a glimmer on the horizon.

"Patience, my dear," he whispered at her ear, satisfaction filling him as she shuddered against him. Her eyes still fluttered behind closed lids.

He allowed his fingers to slip further still, dragging them through the soft tangle of curls shielding her from him. He pressed on, lower, to trace her swelling labia with his fingertips. With a delicate, coaxing touch, he laid her open; her wet desire rushed out to meet him, coating his middle finger as it slid between her inner lips. He stroked her slowly, unhurried despite the soft noises she had begun to make and the quivering he could feel in her muscles.

His finger drew slickness up and over her clitoris with only the faintest pressure, enough to turn her exhale into a moan. He pulled his hand away and brought it to his face, inhaling her sweet musk before tasting her, swirling his tongue around his fingers to dine on every trace of her. He had yet to truly indulge that desire, to bury his face between her thighs and feast on her until she begged him to stop. She had been too impatient to allow him such leisurely attentions in their first encounter. And that was not his intent now.

He raised himself higher on his left arm and leaned across her body until he could tease her right nipple with his tongue. His right hand skimmed down her stomach to her thighs, pressing between them and lifting her right leg enough to press his knee between hers. His fingers, now with more room to work, returned to stroking her labia and teasing her clitoris with faint touches. Her hips began to move to the slow rhythm he had set; his own arousal became impossible to ignore, her motions a stimulant to his already taxed control.

His mouth closed over her nipple and tugged in a faster rhythm, an apology of sorts for the haste with which he was about to move. He shuffled his hips backward just enough for his hand, sliding through her thighs from the front, to settle his erection between her swollen labia. Now it was his gently insistent thrusting between her thighs that set the rhythm as his fingers on her clitoris rolled and rubbed and pressed.

He moved his head from her breast, lavishing open-mouthed kisses against the roundness of her shoulder. Her slickness made her thighs an inviting haven, warm and wet, but he wanted more, wanted her full participation.

"Svegli per me, la mia bellezza di sonno," he whispered at her neck. "Io sono affamato per le vostre profondita."

He nibbled her jawline and tugged her earlobe with his teeth. Her hips rocked harder against him; when he rose to claim her lips, he found her eyes open and watching him, her pupils swallowing her irises with beguiling darkness.

"Clarice…."

Her name was a drawn-out question on his lips as his erection slid freely between her thighs. He felt the muscles in her neck shift as she turned her head toward him until their lips touched. Her tongue traced his upper lip. He shuddered.

"Yes."

The word had barely left her lips before he thrust inside her, claiming her with cock and tongue both, one hand on her hip to keep her body locked against his own. The sharpness of his need brought a kind of clarity; her every touch, every whimper, the very scent of her, of them, that surrounded him was carefully preserved in his mind as her body grew tense.

He slipped his left arm beneath her neck and brought his forearm up and across her clavicle, his hand closing around her right shoulder. She was rigid in his arms, poised on the edge. Her hands rose to grip his arm, tightly enough that he expected to find bruises there later. Sparks gleamed in his eyes, and his teeth flashed in pleasure at the thought.

She claimed him as much as he claimed her; it was here, in this moment, driving each other beyond themselves, that they both belonged. The knowledge was too much. His climax was unbearably close, and he would have her with him.

He pushed her hair aside with his nose, spread his jaw, and sank his teeth into the nape of her neck. She shrieked her pleasure as she came, her body rippling around him with impossible speed as he thrust and thrust and thrust again to completion.

Her body continued to shiver for long minutes afterward. He held her tightly, humming softly against her as he soothed the marks he had left in her neck. No scent of blood reached his nose; he had not broken the skin. He rocked her back to calmness, easing her return to sleep even as he softened and slipped from her depths.

* * *

><p>Clarice woke to an entirely foreign feeling: contentment.<p>

It wasn't the first time she had woken with a man beside her – but in college and afterward the experience had been rare and filled with awkward discomfort. Would her partner press for morning fun? Would he deliver some half-hearted – or worse, truly felt – declaration of affection? Such concerns had typically sent her hopping out of bed and digging around for her clothes or scampering to the shower before he could wake.

The difference, she knew, was that she hadn't cared for those men, at least not in the way she cared for _him_. Hannibal. The man who lay beside her now, a warm presence behind her, not quite touching. Her skin hummed with satisfaction at his nearness. She was pleasantly sore, assorted muscle aches making themselves known, but nothing she hadn't expected or desired. The stretching had been good for her side, she thought, and her primary focus now was on the ache of emptiness between her legs, the reminder that mere hours before she had felt complete, whole, as she held him tightly within herself.

Her eyes remained closed; behind her lids, she replayed the thrill of awakening under his hands. He had been gently insistent, coaxing her body to respond to his touch, ensuring she was fully in agreement before sating the need he had built in her. And if she were being entirely truthful, it wasn't as though he would have needed to use much persuasion at all. The whole experience had been dreamlike, surreal, and sensual beyond measure.

She rolled to face him, her eyes finally dragging open. They met his, calmly staring back at her.

"Ready to admit to being awake, my dear?"

"I dunno… I kinda like the treatment I get when I'm half-asleep."

"Do you?" His tone was neutral rather than playful, and his eyes studied her face with interest. Had he been concerned about her reaction? Did he believe he had trespassed?

"I do," she confirmed, "as long as you don't object to being on the receiving end of similar treatment."

He rolled toward her enough to gather her in his arms.

"I don't foresee a problem in that area, my dear."

No… no, she didn't foresee a problem in that area either, as his interest was obvious and growing.

"Again?" she murmured, her lips already seeking out his skin. Lazy contentment faded as new urgency flooded her with a rush of heat.

"If you're amenable, my dear."

He ducked his head, his nose rubbing over her neck and collarbone with just enough pressure not to tickle. She could feel his abdomen expand as he inhaled her scent. Her nipples tightened in expectation of his descent.

"Mmm. Is that a 'yes,' Clarice?"

_Oh yeah, that's a definite yes._

As it happened, it was only the first of many.

* * *

><p><strong>Note:<strong> Hannibal is speaking in Italian here: "Svegli per me, la mia bellezza di sonno. Io sono affamato per le vostre profondita." The approximate translation is "Wake for me, my sleeping beauty. I am hungry/starving/yearning for your depths." (With thanks again to fellow Lecterphile and author lovinghannibal for assistance in capturing the nuance!)


	26. Chapter 26

They had showered together. It was not an experience he had shared before - too intimate, too indicative of a desire for sensuality, a feeling that went beyond lust. But when he had suggested, in gentlemanly fashion, that she shower first, she had simply pulled him along with her from the bed.

"You too, Hannibal. We both reek of sex."

She hadn't sounded displeased by the knowledge; in fact, she had buried her face against his chest and hummed happily. The scent was strong, both on them and in the room, clinging to the sheets and hanging in the air, but he did not rush to open a window and dilute it with fresher air. They had indulged in vigorous activity three times in less than twelve hours; it was hardly unforeseen that their mingled scents should so thoroughly permeate the room.

And although more... activity... in the shower was an idea he intended to fully explore with her, he had not done so this morning, mindful of the soreness she would be feeling today - in her abdominal muscles if nowhere else. Stretching them was an important part of healing them, but he suspected they had crossed the line between therapy and overexertion. Instead, he had enjoyed closeness without carnal intent. She had given him the right to touch her whenever he liked and trusted he would not abuse it, had she not?

So he had washed her hair for her, and soaped her body with more care than he used on his own, and watched the water run down her skin as she rinsed clean. When they stepped out, he dried her gently, once again enjoying the excuse to run his hands over her. He would know the feel of her from memory now, instantly, as vivid a sensation in his fingertips as her image woke in his eyes.

He dressed casually, in charcoal gray wool slacks and a collared shirt in a paler gray with a burgundy cable-knit sweater overtop – enjoying, as he did, the sight of Clarice, nude, rummaging through the dresser, atop which now sat a familiar puzzle box. _Redecorating already, my dear? _But he was pleased, in truth, at the additional sign of her comfort in sharing the same space and the depth of her attachment to the gifts he had chosen for her.

Being uncertain of her desires, he had, indeed, stocked both this room and the guest room with clothing in her size. He was unsurprised to see her select a pair of black trousers in the overly pocketed cargo-pant style she preferred, pairing it with a fitted cashmere sweater in dusky blue.

She smirked at him when she caught him watching her. He tipped his head to acknowledge the point.

"Is there anything of import you wish to do today, my dear?"

She crossed the room and circled around him slowly, her gaze warmly cataloging him from head to foot. She stopped behind him; he forced himself not to turn.

"Other than stick to you like glue?" Her nose nuzzled the back of his neck, her arms wrapping around his chest. "Nope. Can't think of a thing."

She propped her chin on his shoulder. She was quite... tactile, this morning, he noted. _Relaxed. Confident. Secure in my affections, perhaps? Pleased with the new direction she has chosen for her life?  
><em>  
>"What did you have in mind?"<p>

"A bit of an excursion," he said, mildly, as though it were no more than a passing thought. "Today is the winter solstice. I thought we might select a Christmas tree."

With her mouth so close to his ear, he could not fail to hear the soft hitch in her breathing.

"You want to celebrate Christmas?"

"If you like."

"Together."

"I would hardly do so alone, Clarice. And it does seem to be the appropriate time for beginning new traditions and reviving those of old that bring us... comfort."

She squeezed his chest more tightly, and he raised a hand to clasp hers. Her lips grazed his neck.

"Yeah, it does seem like the right time. I want... this isn't..."

She sighed, lightly, her head tipping gently against his. When she spoke again, he could feel the reverberations in his skull.

"I feel things when I'm with you that I've never felt before. And I don't ever want that feeling to end."

It was a difficult, intimate admission for her, he knew. She guarded her emotions tightly; her trust and vulnerability in these matters were reserved for him alone. That she could make such a statement without being sleepy or drugged, without the perceived safety or distance of barriers between them, was a gift.

"Nor do I, Clarice," he murmured before dropping his hand from hers. Calling attention to her vulnerability would only send her into hiding. His voice was pleasant but brisk as he continued. "If you wish breakfast before we begin our hunt, however, I'm afraid I'll require some freedom of movement."

He turned his head slightly, until their lips nearly touched.

"Precisely how closely does 'glue' stick, my dear?"

She laughed.

"You couldn't work around me? Pretend I'm not even here?"

No, that he could not do, he thought; he had had quite enough of her absence to last him a lifetime.

"Ignore your presence? You're an entirely too lovely distraction."

She slipped her arms from around him, then, and moved toward the door.

"How's about I start the shopping list while you work."

"List?"

"Oh, yeah. No half-assing Christmas. If we're gonna do it, we're gonna do it right."

* * *

><p>She quizzed him while he made breakfast. Pancake batter, she thought, though why he had put cranberries in a glass of orange juice first was known only to him.<p>

"Tinsel or garland?"

"Do you truly desire to litter our abode with stray bits of tinsel, Clarice?"

"Garland it is."

She made a note, more as a way to keep her hands busy than from any true need. It wasn't as though she would forget what they wanted - and if she did suddenly develop Christmas-shopping-induced amnesia, Hannibal would hardly fail to remember.

"White lights or multicolored?"

"Did you wish for a scene of classic elegance or something more appropriate for a burlesque house?"

"So you're saying my father was running a brothel every time he strung up the Christmas lights?" She tried to keep an edge in her voice, but it was hard when she wanted to laugh.

"Most assuredly not. I expect operating such an establishment would have greatly changed the financial situation in your household – and, likewise, greatly changed the course of the values that have shaped your life."

She hadn't expected a serious answer to such a ridiculous question. But he must know something about reversals of fortune and life-changing events, she thought. Because somehow he had gone from being the beloved son in a well-off family to being a man alone, a man who thought nothing of taking another's life.

Gently, tentatively, she responded.

"I'm guessing it wasn't a brothel that greatly changed the course of your life, either."

"No." Definitely pancakes, she noted, distracting herself from pressuring him for a more complete answer as he poured the batter out in perfect circles he then flipped with a light touch. With cranberries and… almonds? "It was the war, my dear. The war changed the course of many millions of lives."

He said it flatly, as though whatever the war had done to his life mattered no more to him than what it had done to those millions of others. As if his pain didn't matter. As if _he_ didn't matter. It wasn't an experience she would ever understand, she expected. Events had conspired to make her childhood unstable, but the entire world had been unstable when he was a child.

"Your family?"

"The war came to our doorstep. I survived."

_And they didn't._ He hadn't said the words, but the implication was obvious. And so was the slight tightening of his shoulders, now that she was looking for it. He was waiting for her to push, she knew.

"So, angel or star? For the top of the tree."

His hand paused on the spatula.

"A star, I think, Clarice." He resumed his work at the stove. "The other would be superfluous in this house."

* * *

><p>He took her to the Christmas market, and they wandered among the stalls like children, young lovers in the heady rush of first romance. Her giddy delight was infectious and - although he remained keenly aware of their surroundings and noted that she, too, instinctively shifted to watch for blind corners and suspicious behavior - he allowed himself to simply enjoy the experience.<p>

So when she looked at him, laughing and red-cheeked, to offer him a slice of her Christmas orange, the juice fresh on her lips, he ignored the fruit and its seller and the crowd moving past to focus on a more pleasurable pursuit: swiping his tongue across her lips to taste their flavor before pulling her body against his and kissing her more thoroughly.

When he let her go, his hand still around her back to steady her, she watched him with dazed arousal in her eyes. Slowly, the corner of her mouth shifted into a smirk.

"We need to get more of these oranges."

"It's not the oranges, my dear." He kissed her again, with more chaste decorum. "It's you."

Silence reigned, as she took his gloved hand in hers and led him to the next stall and the next. Finally, as she studied a display of hand-blown glass ornaments, she spoke.

"I've never done this before."

"This?" he asked, though he expected he knew quite well what she meant.

"Had a… relationship. Something that wasn't just superficial." Her head turned slightly, and he perceived that she was watching him for a response. "And I think you haven't, either."

Superficial. Yes, that accurately described his previous romantic entanglements. And it described nothing of his relationship with Clarice Starling.

"Obvious, is it, my dear?"

"If I didn't know better, I'd think we were both in high school."

"Because my affection for you is so obvious, or because my stamina and technique are a disappointment?"

She laughed, fully and freely; he smiled, cherishing the sound.

"Oh god, the former, definitely. I have no complaints about the latter. But if you're feeling insecure, you can demonstrate again later." A few more chuckles slipped out before she regained her control. "It's just… such a relief. To be able to show how I feel about you. To not have to hide it."

* * *

><p>Mulled wine and music.<p>

It wasn't quite like the tree-decorating she remembered from her girlhood, but the feelings were the same. Comfort. Warmth. Laughter.

They had set up the tree near the front window, centered in the space, upon their return from the market. And now they had a fire in the fireplace, mugs of warm, cinnamon-spiced wine, and a stereo piping out Christmas music - more Vienna Boys Choir than "Jingle Bells," but beautiful all the same.

Clarice unwound the lights and fed them to Hannibal at a steady pace as he affixed them to the branches. Her fingers itched for a ruler, because she was pretty sure that his placement, by naked eye alone, was precisely equidistant for each bulb in all directions. When he'd finished, and she ceremonially pushed in the plug, the tree looked as though it had been draped in a shimmering white net.

They added garland next, and the ornaments they had chosen at the market. His, she noted, tended toward stars and snowflakes and geometric patterns. Their tree would not have the kitschy Santas and Rudolphs and oversized multicolored bulbs she recalled from her own childhood. But that was fine, she thought. Better than fine.

What they put on the tree didn't matter; it was the act of choosing together, the companionship now as they decorated, that mattered. And their tree would be classically elegant, a mix of pale winter blues and white with a large but not gaudy silver star on top. The sort she had once seen only in magazines, the sort she had imagined graced rich people's homes. The sort that Clarice Starling would never have in her living room.

_But I do now. Classical elegance. And it's not the tree; it's him. It's us. _

She slowed in her decorating efforts as she took more time to watch him. He hummed softly with the music. The fire in the fireplace crackled. The light from the tree and the flames softened edges, giving everything a gentle glow. He chose ornaments with care, as precise in their placement as he had been with the lights, though the criteria for perfection were beyond her understanding. And he hadn't challenged her choices; every ornament she placed remained where she left it, welcome bits of random whimsy in his grand design.

_Because we fit. We're more than the sum of our parts. When we step back and look, it all just... falls into place. _

She had never thought she'd be so cloyingly saccharine about romance. Such things were frivolous, _girly_, and Clarice Starling had never been either of those. But instinct told her something deeper lay at the edge of her knowledge, a feeling she couldn't quite grasp but knew the shape of, somehow. It was only natural, wasn't it? To be so caught up in each other during this... honeymoon period?

He felt it too, didn't he?

He turned to look at her then, and she realized she'd been holding an ornament, unmoving, for entirely too long. The firelight caught the sparks in his eyes. She hung the ornament and stretched her hand out for his.

"Finished, Clarice?" God, that warm, tender voice would be her undoing every time.

"It's perfect, don't you think?" She pulled her gaze from his to run a critical eye over the tree.

"I do," he confirmed, though his tone told her the tree itself had not figured largely in his thoughts.

"C'mere." She pulled him to the couch. "Let's bask in perfection awhile."


	27. Chapter 27

If Clarice wished to settle on the sofa all evening and admire their handiwork, then Hannibal Lecter would oblige her. It was not, after all, a hardship to be seated beside her, to watch the fiery tongues of light dancing over her form, to sip his vin brulé and be content with his lot.

She had pulled her feet up with her, and her toes now slipped under the outside of his thigh, flexing slightly in her stockings. He rested a hand on her shin, rubbing lightly over her slacks.

"If you're cold, my dear, I can easily stoke the fire."

She made an inarticulate sound of disagreement.

"Just getting comfortable. Don't go anywhere, OK? I really like where we are right now."

From the emotions he had sensed in her attitude all day, he expected she meant more than merely their position on the sofa.

"Of course, Clarice. I find myself quite pleased with the outcome as well."

"I just can't believe that..." She shook her head, briefly, as though clearing some confusion. "That morning, heading out to the farmhouse, I was thinking about you. Did I tell you that? Thinking I was finally ready to say the hell with it all. And I was... smug about it. Full of myself."

A smile crossed her face, some small private amusement, and then her eyes flicked to his with something like embarrassment, and he knew she would share the thought.

"I went off on the senior agent. Just laid into him the way you would've laid into some pretentious psychologist trying to test you, and I... god, by the end of it, I was imitating you. Deliberately. To freak him the fuck out."

He ignored the coarse language; it had its own charm, when it came in her delightfully improperly accented speech. An imperfection he would not seek to correct.

"And was it successful, Clarice?" That she had modeled her behavior on his did not surprise him. In finding her own voice, she would, naturally, have sought to sample the ones around her that resonated most powerfully.

"Did I freak him out? Oh yeah. He didn't say another word, not until we got to the farm - and then he only blustered like the incompetent jackass he was until he took a shotgun blast in the face."

"While you saved the day." His tone was light, jesting, though he expected the sentiment was not inaccurate, from the newspaper accounts and what he had managed to glean through her own words and Jack Crawford's overheard conversations.

She shrugged off his assessment.

"Humphries was an idiot. Gebb was a coward. I did what was necessary."

In her own mind, yes, he thought.

"The FBI just wanted a simple story with some dead heroes." Disdain colored her voice. She had begun to distance herself from that life, from that perspective. It was time to play devil's advocate, to be certain she saw the break and knew it for what it was.

"Necessary, Clarice? There are many who would have acted as Agent Gebb did. Some would say your actions were reckless rather than courageous. Would it not have been more prudent to retreat to the vehicle and maintain a standoff while waiting for more agents to arrive?"

Her angry stare challenged him.

"No. There weren't enough of us to keep him pinned down. Backup was a long way off. He would have killed the girl while we cowered behind the damn car. Would you have sat there while he was killing a little girl?"

"We're talking about you, my dear." His tone was mild; it irritated her, he knew, sharpened her anger and brought passion to her eyes.

"And _I_ want to know what you would have done. So, would you, Doctor? Knowing what would have happened to that little girl, would you have walked away?"

He thought of Mason Verger, carving his face with a mirror shard. It had amused him to toy with such a perfect example of puffed-up arrogance, true, but hadn't Mason's actions – his unspeakable discourtesy to those children – offended him on some level? Wasn't that part of what had so amused him? Wasn't that why he'd encouraged Mason to destroy the friendly face and charming smile that lured children so easily?

"Perhaps not, Clarice," he admitted. "Though I _might_ have walked away, were _that_ necessary, as you say. Had I acted as you did, my dear, it would have been for my own amusement."

Would she be disappointed in such an answer? No, her gaze was appraising, but it seemed she had not found him wanting.

"So long as we get to the same answer, Doctor, I find I don't much care whether duty or whimsy motivates us."

She had been calling him Hannibal all day; it seemed, however, that her mind had reverted as their conversation had grown more adversarial. He wondered whether she defined the difference so sharply in her conscious thoughts - he, Hannibal, her lover, and him, the doctor, her... manipulator? Now was not the time to ask her, but he would be vigilant about such verbal slips.

"The ends justify the means, Clarice? How delightfully Machiavellian of you."

"Don't push it, Doctor. I'm still working on this whole re-creating my own morality from the ground up thing. I don't need you mocking me."

"Not mockery, Clarice, I assure you. I simply wish for you to be entirely clear about the full extent of the path you are traveling down."

She was quiet, then, though it took no particular skill to recognize the look of concentration on her face, to know that thoughts must be tumbling with some speed behind her eyes. But where the tumbling would take her… well, the uncertainty always did make her a fascinating partner.

Her breath deepened; she had reached some conclusion, some decision point. A second deep breath. Her exploration must have taken her somewhere provocative, he thought.

"Hannibal… will you tell me about your lamb now?"

He kept his composure, though it was a near thing. The silence was lengthy, but she did not step into the gap, did not retract her question. _Now, yes. It's time._

"Do you recall, Clarice, telling me once that I would never allow my lamb to be harmed, except by choice, for my own benefit?"

"At the museum."

Her response was speedy indeed; perhaps she had been thinking of the same moment. She wrinkled her nose, seemingly unhappy with her recall of it.

"I was defensive and angry."

"Mmm. I admit, I do so enjoy provoking your anger. You burn beautifully with rage, my dear."

He leaned in, across her legs, and kissed her, a gentle brush of his lips on hers, pulling away before she could begin to truly respond. Seduction was not his purpose; he simply felt a… need… to fortify himself with her acceptance, her eager welcome of him, before going on.

And afterward, he stayed close, allowing her fingers to stroke along his clavicle, dipping into the fossa jugularis sternalis. The motion was soothing; perhaps she had sensed the difficult nature of the conversation to come.

"Yeah, I remember… but you didn't seem delighted then. I remember thinking you were angry… offended, maybe… and then I got distracted. No… you intentionally distracted me with a veiled threat. And I chased after it…." She tapped her fingers lightly against his clavicle. "You're a better gamesman than I."

"I've had more practice, my dear. Though my diversion was not quite so intentional as you believe; the change of subject was greatly facilitated by your suspicion. Fortuitous, from my perspective; I was, as you noted, not nearly so sanguine on the subject we might otherwise have stumbled upon."

She studied him, understanding, perhaps, that his continued closeness bespoke a… discomfort… uncommon in his experience. A need for reassurance? Surely not. And yet… the sharing of this knowledge was a risk. He could not entirely predict her reaction.

"But you're ready to talk about it now?"

"I am."

"Then I'll listen."

Her words came simply, without adornment. Her hand dropped from his throat. She did not rush to reassure him or attempt to draw him out.

No, in this she showed patience, a virtue she rarely possessed. She was still, waiting, allowing him to speak in his own time.

He would return the courtesy. He would neither draw out his pain to gain her sympathy nor diminish his acts to spare her the depth of his… depravity, as society would call it. _But will she?_ No matter - she deserved the truth from him, and she would have it.

"I, too, once burned with rage, Clarice. I fed that rage by hunting and killing the men who murdered my sister."

Her nostrils flared, her head lifting slightly as she breathed.

"I sought them out, one by one, and reveled in their destruction. Do not mistake me, Clarice – I do still. I would not undo what I have done."

She frowned, just a bit; her teeth tugged at her bottom lip.

"Ask, Clarice."

"Did it work? Killing them? The rage…."

"I learned to quiet the rage, to harness it, a willing servant to more elaborate intellectual pursuits. The acts themselves became nothing more than an intellectual exercise. I enjoyed the challenge. At the last, the killing itself was merely… aesthetic."

"And your sister was still dead."

"Yes. Mischa was still dead. For a time, I hoped to change that. You were correct in some respects with your unwitting barb, Clarice. Her death did benefit me, as it did the deserters who had taken over our home and locked the children away. It was a long, bitter winter, you see, and we were a reliable source of sustenance when the forest did not provide. They sated their hunger with her flesh and fed me the broth from their stew. I may well have died that winter had my sister not been plump with baby fat. I myself was too scrawny to please their palates."

He paused to judge her response; a faint trembling seemed to be wracking her body. Her eyes shone, though her cheeks remained dry.

"Have I horrified you enough for one day, then? You're shaking, my dear."

"I'm shaking because you are, Hannibal," she whispered.

He glanced down and saw she spoke the truth; his hand crushed hers in a tight grip, and the tremble originated in his own forearm. He lifted his hand from hers, noting the red and white splotches left behind on her skin, blood rushing to resume its normal course underneath. His own hand trembled in midair between them.

"Ah. So I am." _Astonishing._

She tugged on his arm, then, pulling him forward, and he allowed the movement. When she had settled them to her satisfaction, he found himself lying with his head atop her breasts, the thrumming of her heart a satisfactory melody beneath his ear. Her fingers wove their way through his hair.

"Maybe I was right about some things, Hannibal, but I was wrong, too. You would have gone in her stead if they had given you the choice. And then you wouldn't be here now." She paused; her heartbeat came faster to his ear. "I'm sorry that she was taken from you so cruelly; I'm sorry that she died. But I'm not sorry that you lived. Whatever you've done… whatever you _will_ do… I'm so very glad that you lived to be able to do it."

He closed his eyes, relaxing into her embrace, and the memory that came to him then was not one of terror, of stark cold and gnawing hunger; it was not the baby-soft fingers slipping from his own. No, this memory was of a sunny smile, a delighted giggle, fat little fingers patting first a gleaming purple eggplant and then his cheek with more enthusiasm than grace.

If tears slipped from beneath his eyelids, they were merely an expression of his joy at the warmth that sheltered him as he rested and the smile that greeted him in his dreams.

* * *

><p>He had been waiting for this. Waiting for her to be ready to listen, to understand, without judgment or pity. But he had been waiting much longer than that, she thought. It seemed likely that he had never spoken the words before, just as she had not recounted the whole truth of the lambs to any but him. The bare facts, yes; the emotions, no.<p>

And she was the one he had chosen. Saw a kinship with, if she had read him correctly. There were, she suspected, only two things in the world that might hurt Hannibal Lecter: the memory of that long-ago winter and the possibility of her rejection.

She could do nothing about the first. It was not pity he sought, not tears and platitudes, not horror and false comfort. Events had unfolded as they had, and he had done what he could - what the nobility in his nature dictated. As a child, he had survived. As a young man, he had settled the debt. As a man grown, he had invited her in and allowed her to stare into the well of darkness he might otherwise drown in.

Her arms lay around him, clasping him to her; he slept childlike, boneless, with one of her hands still moving slowly through his hair and the other resting atop the firmly rounded muscle of his shoulder. What she felt for this man was not pity. It was love. Boundless and free, fierce and protective. Had they been disturbed in this moment, she would have swatted down the interruption like a mother bear defending her cub and not thought twice about it.

Because he was vulnerable. And he was _hers_. And she would not allow him to come to harm if she could prevent it.

Thus the second - the possibility of her rejection - was a demon he would never face. If she was his lamb now, an addition to the flock alongside the lost Mischa, then equally was he hers. She would not curb his predatory instincts any more than he would curb hers, but she would watch over him. He would know, unquestionably, that he was loved. That his actions, in keeping with his nature, would not be cause for her to leave him.

He had killed with purpose, at first. He had done so with pleasure, to quiet the screams that he had surely heard in his nightmares. But when that task was complete, he had found something else in it. Artistry. Challenge. Beauty. It was something like a symphony to him now, she expected. Not a need, not a consuming drive, but a pleasant diversion as he examined each intricate note and its relation to the whole.

_And now we're a duet. _

She watched the fire die and felt no need to reach for a blanket. The heat of his body warmed her. It was enough. _They_ were enough.

* * *

><p>Hannibal Lecter woke slowly, his senses registering a wealth of information before his eyes ever opened.<p>

The gentle rise and fall of Clarice's chest beneath his head. The feel of her left leg against his hip, where it had risen to cradle him more securely. The softness behind her right knee, where his fingers had drifted in his sleep. The press of her fingers in his hair. The comforting scent of her in his nostrils, and from further off, a sharp burst of pine from the tree as well as the lingering spice of the wine and the stronger char from the fireplace, both now cold. A faint itching on his cheeks, a hint of salt… had he shed tears, all unknowing?

The room was silent but for their slow breathing. _All is well._

He opened his eyes.

The Christmas lights illuminated the room well enough. The wineglasses yet rested on the table in front of him. The fire had gone out. The hour was late, he judged, and though he had no complaints with his current resting place, his weight would cause Clarice discomfort eventually, for all that she slept now.

He shifted, rolling his shoulder, but the movement failed to dislodge Clarice's arm where it curled around his own. Quite the opposite, in fact – her hand moved in a soothing circle against his back and a soft hum escaped her lips. He smiled, bemused by the protection and comfort she offered instinctively, and pressed a gentle kiss to her breast through her shirt.

"A moment only, Clarice, hmm?" He kept his voice low, coaxing. "And then I'll return to your arms, my dear."

A soft "mmph" might have been agreement. Whether it was or not, she did not fight him as he slipped from her embrace and stood. He tended to the necessities without delay – stirring the fireplace embers to be certain no hint of fire remained to spark and turning off the lights on the tree – and returned to the sofa to gather her into his arms.

He cradled her against his body as he carefully negotiated the stairs, pleased when he could pass the guest bedroom without stopping, without needing to leave her there alone as he had on their last night in Saarbrucken.

The bed lay unmade. He placed her on the sheet and removed his own clothes before reaching for hers. Nightclothes would be unnecessary, he judged; there was little need for modesty in any case, and he would rather enjoy the feel of her sleep-warmed skin than any gown she might don.

Her breathing changed slightly as he slid into bed beside her and pulled the covers over them both. Her arms reached for him; he nestled willingly against her. Half-open, her eyes met his before she pressed their mouths together. It was a gentle kiss, searching but not urgent, and he sensed she meant to offer comfort.

He copied her movements, the slow swipe of a tongue, the lingering touch of lips, hands meeting the planes and curves of hip and back and breast. No need drove them but a desire for closeness, for unity, and when he entered her it was merely another point of connection for their tangled bodies.


	28. Chapter 28

The benefits of a morning spent snowshoeing were not immediately apparent to Clarice Starling. It was cold out, for one. And balance was tricky with those giant platforms strapped to her feet.

Sure, a snowy landing was a soft one - but it was still damn cold on her ass. And because she had stubbornly insisted upon exercising by herself, Hannibal was living it up in the kitchen... where he undoubtedly had an excellent view of her making an idiot of herself in the yard.

It was a good workout, true, and she could feel the pleased ache in her legs and core muscles. And he served up a warm, filling lunch when she'd finally unstrapped her feet from the nightmarish contraptions. And then he'd pointed out that the master bath had a lovely soaking tub.

That was better, sure - but it wasn't until she had emerged from the bath to find him waiting for her with warm massage oil and firm hands that the benefits of snowshoeing became brilliantly clear.

When she spoke, teasingly, her voice was muffled just a bit by the soft pillow beneath her cheek.

"That suggestion you made this morning to try out the snowshoes - that was totally an excuse for this, wasn't it."

"It was also an approved activity with a somewhat less stressful impact than running." His voice was fluid and calm, though she thought she detected a hint of teasing, too. "Of course, I had not anticipated that you might fall quite so often."

"Ha ha, funny guy."

His hands splayed across her lower back, and she arched into his strength.

"And I hardly require an excuse to lay hands upon you, Clarice, now do I?"

"Mmmmmm. Nope. No excuses necessary. Touch at will."

* * *

><p>He took her at her word, allowing his hands to roam across her skin, stroking and gripping and soothing tension where he found it. She was unselfconscious in her nudity today, he noted, despite the afternoon sunlight flooding the room. He himself had stripped to his shorts, leaving them as an indication to her that he had no expectations, no demands, for this activity. Massage was often a prelude to more carnal pursuits, true, but his purposes for touching her at this time were more practical and emotional than physical.<p>

The scarring on her back was still reddened against the surrounding skin and slightly raised, dotted with suture marks to either side. The anterior damage was greater than what he saw now, he knew; though he had not asked her about the specifics, it seemed likely that the blade had lodged in a fixed point behind her, leaving the wound in her back much smaller than the one in her abdomen.

He was careful as he massaged the repaired tissue; its tensile strength was significantly diminished from the surrounding skin and would remain so, even once she had fully regained her muscle tone. His hand paused; the fullness of his palm covered the scar entirely.

Clarice made a questioning noise in her throat and turned over beneath his hand.

"Not so beautiful?" Her tone was light but unsure; her fingers ran along the larger scar beginning just below her ribcage. He brushed her fingers aside with his own, thoughtfully stroking, feeling the changes in texture and height as his sensitive fingertips traced her skin.

"I've done you a disservice if you feel you must ask, Clarice."

"I was thinking of you."

Her words were abrupt, her tone distant; he affected lightness in response.

"Just now? One would hope so, my dear."

The slightest quirk of a smile touched her lips.

"I was lying on that filthy floor, staring up at his face, with the knife flashing through the edge of my sightline… and all I could think about was your knife against my throat."

That night in Saarbrucken. He had nearly lost control – no, he _had _done so for a moment. Long enough to be a threat to her, if only in his mind. Long enough to realize he did not wish to see her bleed.

"You never flinched," he murmured. His fingers stroked her neck.

"I didn't think you would hurt me. And if I was wrong..."

There was a pain in her eyes, an old pain that he suspected still ached when light touched it too harshly.

"Finish your thought, Clarice."

"Then I deserved what I got, didn't I? For being so blind?"

_Such nonchalance, Clarice? Your judgment against yourself is the cruelest cut. How odd it feels, this persistent desire to press my lips to your wounds to heal rather than harm. _

"Mmm. On some level, you believed you deserved it anyway."

"I did, yeah. Some days, I think I might have wanted it."

A chill rolled through him. If he had waited too long, would it have come to that? His Starling was too feisty, too principled, perhaps, to actively consider suicide - but in her profession, death would have found her easily if she sought it out again and again. Had he seen her progressing along that path, his intentions would have been set aside with no more than a moment's thought; he would have taken her then, accepting that she could not, through patience and free will, be made to see the truth. He would have stripped her of the choice and imposed his will upon her until she could no longer distinguish it from her own.

He frowned, needing to hear the refutation from her lips. Were it still a concern, it would need to be handled.

"But no longer?"

"I didn't flinch on the floor in that kitchen in Nebraska, either, but not because I thought he wouldn't kill me and not because I thought I deserved it. Not because I was stupid for not making sure of him first. Not because I almost lost the lamb. Not because I felt guilty."

He waited, patient and pleased, for her to admit aloud to the magnitude of the mental shift she had undergone. Mere months ago, such things would have haunted her, he knew. In her drive for perfection, she would have judged herself harshly - castigated herself for not securing the perpetrator, for not checking him for weapons before going after the girl - nevermind that her thought process had undoubtedly been clouded by her injuries.

Perhaps that was all it had been - an oversight caused by concussion. But perhaps, given the shift in her understanding, perhaps it had been deliberate on a subconscious level. Perhaps, by allowing for the chance that he might yet attack her, she had given herself a ready excuse to kill the odious man.

"Because I knew _he_ deserved it. I made the judgment; I have no regrets about it. After I... after I shot Jame Gumb, you know, I had a few nights where I didn't dream at all. Because Catherine was safe. But then, for a long time, I would see it all when I closed my eyes. If only I had handled _this_ differently. If only I had done _that _instead. Second-guessing myself, every step, all the ways that wouldn't have ended with me killing a man with a shot in the dark. It didn't matter that he had done horrible things. I couldn't stop myself from thinking that the judgment shouldn't have come from my gun. A trial, a conviction, a life sentence, the death penalty, even - that would have been justice. As if it made a difference, as if faceless strangers who weren't even there could decide guilt or innocence better than I could in the moment."

She paused, and he wondered if, in her description, she recognized that he himself had gotten that kind of justice and subsequently escaped it... and how she felt about it now, if she did at all.

"I haven't dreamed once about Leonard Cook. And I don't think I'll ever lose sleep over his death. He deserved what he got."

He smiled at her, repeating the salient point to reinforce it in her mind.

"No regrets, Clarice?"

"Not a one." She tugged him down beside her on the bed. "Sometimes, you just gotta have the courage to try new things."

"I am quite grateful for your courage, my dear, as without it you would not be here, but – forgive my bluntness, Clarice – you possess a much more modest stock of caution and an even scanter store of patience. You place yourself in danger if the slightest possibility exists that by so doing you might save an innocent. It is… an alarming tendency in the woman I love."

* * *

><p>She turned to study him, hearing what he did not say as much as what he did. He would never ask her to be anything but herself, but he worried for her. It was a fear-driven need that had brought him to her side in the hospital, prompted him to take such risks – to prioritize seeing her alive and breathing above protecting his freedom. Even half a year ago, she could not have imagined such a thing, that she should be so central to his existence.<p>

Her hand reached for his face, fingers fluttering at his temple, sliding down to caress his jaw.

"I don't know why you love me, Hannibal, but I am immensely pleased that you do."

He captured her hand in his and pressed a kiss to her knuckles.

"The sentiment is a shared one, Clarice. I am continually astonished to find you here at my side."

"Even after all the effort you put into getting me here?" She nudged him back, rolling her body above his and settling her weight on him, her legs dropping alongside his hips. He was agreeable, if the delightfully eager twitches in the boxers beneath her were any indication. "I know why I don't have any patience – it's because you're hoarding it all."

His hands stroked upward over her thighs.

"Mmm. And you plan to take it from me, do you?"

She shivered; she did love the feel of his fingertips, and they now lay tantalizingly close to the nerves already thumping in time with her heartbeat.

"Oh, I'm gonna take something from you." She leaned down until her breasts just barely rested against his chest, sliding forward and relishing the friction on sensitive skin. "I don't think it's patience, though."

"Perhaps an exchange, then?" His thumb left its spot cradled in the crease of her thigh and slipped across the hood shielding her pulsing nerves. Her eyes closed; she inhaled long and deep as the pad of his thumb teasingly circled. "Might I offer you a double share of pleasure in return for your allowing me the lion's share of patience?"

She huffed a laugh and lowered her face to nuzzle at his neck.

"That hardly seems like a fair exchange. I get all of the enjoyment, and you get all of the frustration."

His hips pressed upward; he was hardening beneath her now, and his heat was intoxicating.

"Good things come to those who wait, Clarice. And your pleasure is quite pleasing to me."

His thumb stroked firmly, twice, three times, in rapid succession. She bucked against him, legs clutching his hips with force, a breathy moan emerging from her lips, mere inches from his ear. He turned and captured her lips with his mouth, a kiss that made her muscles tremble.


	29. Chapter 29

"So tomorrow we feast?"

"Mm-hmm."

He was fully awake – had been, in fact, even before she had begun shifting and stretching and arriving at wakefulness herself. But the lazier his responses, the closer she snuggled into his side, and he was hardly about to discourage that.

"And Saturday we play?" Her movements conveyed the suggestion of more than music.

"Mm-hmm." His hands strayed to her hips.

"But today, I get to pick, right?"

"It is your birthday, my dear. If you'd care to put in a breakfast order, I'll begin preparations immediately."

"Nope."

"Shall I surprise you, then?"

"Nuh-uh." She reached for his hand and settled it firmly against her sex. "You should stay right here. All day."

"I believe the purpose of one's birthday is to _receive_ gifts, Clarice, not to grant them to others." But his fingers slid lightly over her heated flesh, feeling the moisture already gathering there. She was an… _enthusiastic_… partner, and hardly shy about it. They had made love yesterday afternoon following her massage and again that night before falling asleep. It was possible that she might be the death of him. "But if it's truly your wish…."

Her own hand had traveled down his flank and grasped him now with clear intent.

"I'm pretty sure I'm holding the gift I want to receive, Hannibal. Unless you're going to go back on your word and tell me I can't pick my own present."

"Far be it from me to dissuade you, my dear. A woman who knows her own mind is a wondrous creature."

It was nearly noon before she allowed him to leave the bed. Not that he was of a mind to complain about such treatment; in this, her pleasure was his as well. Eager, inventive, and unexpectedly insatiable – such appetites were to be encouraged rather than suppressed. But such appetites also required fuel to maintain, which was how he found himself in the kitchen putting together a tray of items to entice his young lover into considering desires beyond the sexual.

When he returned to the bedroom with her birthday luncheon, he found she had finally deigned to leave the bed herself, though she hadn't gone far. He set the tray on the nightstand and approached her where she stood at the French doors to the balcony.

She had pulled the quilt around herself, though by the bare skin revealed where it dipped across her back, he judged she had not donned clothes beneath. The fingers of her left hand rested against the glass. The angle of the sun did not allow him to see her expression reflected in the glass, and the snow on the balcony lay undisturbed. He stepped in closer, slipping his arms around her waist.

"It's a bit cold for lunch on the balcony, my dear, but if you wish it…."

She shook her head lightly; he felt the shift of her hair against his cheek. She let her hand fall from the glass.

"Nope. I had my chance last summer, and I missed it. Maybe next year, though."

"A chance for lunch on the balcony?"

"Not exactly."

She turned out of his embrace, pulling him with her to the bed. Her evasion intrigued him; surely she knew he would pursue the subject with more vigor now. Perhaps she wanted him to – consciously or not.

He settled against the headboard and retrieved their lunch, determined to provide at least some semblance of sustenance for their bodies before Clarice decided to resume their previous activities. Her thoughts had already drifted in that direction, he expected, from the deepening of her scent, and he felt the answering effects stirring in himself.

"Will you elaborate, Clarice, or shall I venture a guess?"

She raised an eyebrow in question, her hand paused in mid-reach toward the tray.

"Elaborate on what?"

"Your missed chance. It is your birthday, after all. If you make a wish, I will not fail to fulfill it, Clarice."

She colored, then, a vivid blush that had him quite curious indeed, though he now had a theory.

"It's not… I mean, you already… this morning… and the snow…."

"Lunch was not quite the meal you had in mind on the balcony?"

His tone was suggestive; he had, in fact, enjoyed a quite filling meal this morning, though he had not left the bed to partake in it. But he was at a loss to explain why the balcony featured in her fantasies.

And now she was calming herself by sampling the food he had prepared. She had chosen a pear-and-prosciutto roll with a bit of parmesan and arugula, he noted; a pleasant mix of sweet and salt.

"This is really good. Did you throw this together just now?"

"Clarice…." He dragged out her name in a teasing rebuke.

"I know, I know, you aren't going to let it drop." Her exasperation seemed amused, tolerant, rather than angered, and he knew she would give him the answer he sought.

"You remember – in Saarbrucken, that night – we went to dinner, and those idiot boys – well of course you remember."

She hadn't met his eyes during her rambling opening, and her fingers toyed with another canapé. Her nervousness charmed him; she was quite willing to _perform_ any number of acts, but _talking_ about them seemed to strike at some inborn modesty or childhood moral injunction.

"Before those idiots – it was all… perfect… and I was thinking – I wanted to get home, to finish what we'd started the night before – and you had that balcony upstairs – I just kept seeing it, that railing, with my hands on it, and you kneeling – and, god, your _mouth_ – which, you should know, it's even better in reality—"

Her skin was still flushed, and her breathing had quickened. Her eyes darted up to meet his.

He recalled the night in question quite well; her arousal had been obvious to his senses from the moment they left the restaurant. That she had been having such elaborate, stimulating fantasies, however… _mmm. I must encourage her to share more often. _

"Ah. So that was what had you so... _interested_."

She rolled her eyes at him, though it didn't diminish the blush she had acquired.

"You'll always know, won't you. I'll never be able to surprise you."

"Mmm. Not in that, perhaps, Clarice, though you surprise me in a multitude of other delightful ways."

His hand captured hers, caressing, lifting it to his lips; he kissed the underside of her wrist with tenderness before biting wolfishly into the heel of her hand. She shivered in what was likely pleasure. He held her gaze as his tongue flicked rhythmically against her skin. She wet her lips with her tongue; her breathing pattern quickened further. He inhaled deeply through his nose as she squirmed. Yes, definitely pleasure. He pulled his lips away with a final ghost of a kiss over her reddened skin.

"Tell the truth, Clarice... wouldn't you prefer a... _knowing_... partner to an inept one?"

Her fingers reached out to stroke downward over his chest alongside the silk edge of his robe. She traveled all the way to his belt, her fingers tugging at the knot to reel him in. No fool, he went willingly.

"You tell me, Mr. Knowledgeable. What do I prefer?"

She allowed the quilt to fall back to the bed and pressed her nude body against his; her nipples lay hard against his chest where his robe had parted. He bent his head to nuzzle her neck.

"Your body speaks for itself, Clarice. I'm hopeful about the prospect of enrolling in an immersive course to reach complete fluency."

Her soft laughter pleased him even more than the delicate fingers slipping inside his robe. But when he reached for her in turn, she shook her head slightly and pushed him back, sliding the robe off his shoulders to fall in a tangle behind him. Her fingers stroked his chest, trailing through the hair over his sternum. He leaned in once more, angling for a kiss, but she thumped her fingers against his chest – in warning, perhaps? – and pushed back more firmly. Amused and intrigued, he allowed her motion to tumble him to the sheets. It was, after all, _her_ birthday; if she wished to play a new game, he would hardly deny her.

So he lay back and watched her as she studied him from where she knelt between his knees. Her scrutiny was not a cause for concern; she was not one to care about surface appearances, he knew, and he was unusually fit for a man of his years. Fit enough to keep up with her in bed, at the least, and to ensure their safety in most physical confrontations, and he had no need for more than that. He was not, however, so immune to the lure of ego as to be dismissive of her attention. Thus he watched her closely, hopeful that his body was as pleasing to her as hers was to him.

Her hands settled on his thighs, kneading softly. She was silent, focused, the morning's playful banter gone from her now. Something was different in her; he perceived that this interaction was more serious to her than those earlier in the day had been.

Given the frequency of their encounters, his arousal was slow to develop despite his desire for her. He might, if he wished, put more deliberate effort into redirecting blood flow … but it seemed, from her dominant behavior, from the lack of impatience in her gaze, from the tender softness in her face and hands, that a slow pace, a passive engagement, would not go amiss. She was not rushing toward the main event, so to speak. So he allowed for the natural course of events, involuntary twitches, sparks of excitement, beginning to harden him for her pleasure.

She shifted sideways. Her legs straddled his left thigh now, and her hands came down to either side of his ribcage until she knelt above him on all fours. Their bodies did not touch. And then her head bowed, her hair falling across his chest; he felt the press of her lips on his skin, above his sternum. She turned her face aside and rubbed against him, almost catlike, he thought. Marking him with her scent? Memorizing his own? Their scents had already thoroughly mingled in his nose; he could not, at this moment, separate hers from his.

Her motion continued, her hair a tickling sensation across his chest and arms as her face swept over him, lips occasionally brushing him with affection. It was still the only point of connection between them, though he could feel the warmth of her body hovering above him. Anticipation. Did she wield it to build her own arousal along with his?

She moved lower, her cheek trailing down his abdomen as though she were following a curving track crossing the linea alba to its inferior end at the pubic symphysis. Was that her intent? He did not suppress the instinctive, urgent rush of blood the thought inspired, nor did he stifle the pleased groan that emerged as the eager motion of his swelling erection came into contact with her skin.

He felt her pause, and then she lowered her body, eliminating the distance between them and bringing him a wealth of new information. His mind raced to catalog the sensations – the vibration of her throat as she hummed with pleasure, the press of her breasts just below his hip, the slick heat of her rocking lightly just above his knee. And then her nose nudged at the side of his erection. She breathed deeply. Her cheek slid over him, back and forth, almost… petting. The literal definition of a cocktease, though that was hardly a word that described Clarice Starling.

And it still did not, he thought, as her mouth closed over him. He forced his hips to stillness despite the provocation. It seemed she misunderstood the concept of birthday gifts entirely if she felt fellatio qualified as a gift for _her_ rather than him. Not that he was about to argue the point. As a gentleman, it was neither something he would have expected nor something he would have requested… but as her lips moved over him, he could not deny that it was very, very desirable.

To her, as well, it seemed, from the increased motion of her hips against his leg. With his self-control focused on not thrusting into the sweet suction of her mouth, it was an easy matter to allow his other natural responses free rein, to vocalize his pleasure… and to recognize the pre-orgasmic shudders that rolled through her body each time he did so. His eyes narrowed as he considered the evidence with the small portion of his mind not wholly consumed by the sight and feel of her.

Was that what she wanted? He very carefully, ever so slightly, eased off on his iron control. Her hand gripped him, working in concert with her mouth, her tongue teasing at the height of her upstroke; his hips gave the barest thrust in response. Her reaction was immediate – her pubic bone pressed down hard on his thigh as her legs clenched around his, her free hand covered his hip with moderate force, and she emitted a pleased moan as her mouth slid over him once more.

With her hand holding him down, he loosed his control further; her responses increased proportionately. Instinct urged him to take her now, to pin her to the bed and demonstrate how easily he could make her quake with ecstasy. But that wasn't the gift she wanted.

No. What she sought now was what he had sought as she slept on their first night together. Possession. Ownership. _Control._

And if that was what she needed… proof that she could make him lose control… even that, he would not deny her. He pulled back his control to its thinnest threads, until only the primary injunction – _allow no harm to Clarice _– remained. All else was given over to experiencing _her_, to the feel of her mouth and the thrust of her hips, to the knowledge that he was hers.

The intensity of the emotion and his unbound physical responses conspired to bring him swiftly to the edge. He called to her – a plea, a warning, an acknowledgement of her power over him – and when the inevitable arrived, that last, distant corner of his mind growled in fierce triumph as she, too, cried out her pleasure, her body shaking against his.


	30. Chapter 30

On Christmas Eve, the day after her twenty-eighth birthday, Clarice Starling woke with no idea of what she was in for. True to fulfilling his promise of meeting her every birthday request, Hannibal had exhausted her in bed from morning until midnight – he had, in fact, jokingly stopped in mid-thrust when the downstairs clock began chiming, insisting that her birthday was over.

A bit of creative argument had ended with him conceding her point: gifts, of course, belong to the birthday girl in perpetuity. He would hardly have returned a present to the store at the end of the day, would he? Surely not. Thus, clearly, the gift she had requested - and whose capabilities he had so thoroughly demonstrated – was now hers to do with what she pleased, whenever she pleased.

Her smile might have been a touch smug, she admitted. But he had lowered his mouth to her ear and whispered to her in the tone that never failed to make her body shiver.

"You, my darling minx, had already thought this argument through when you made the request."

"Mmm. Maaaybe."

He had traced the shell of her ear with his tongue then.

"Such forward-thinking cleverness deserves a reward, hmm? Perhaps a birthday bonus." He thrust again, gently, the languid motion extending the friction of skin on skin until she moaned with pleasure.

By the time he'd finished with her, she could hardly have remembered her name if it hadn't been for his voice repeating it in her ear.

Which he was doing again now, only he wasn't naked and curled up beside her and it wasn't dark outside and there was a smell of… _coffee. God yes. _

She opened her eyes and blinked. Yes, Hannibal was standing at the bedside, wearing an apron over his clothes and holding a cup of coffee.

"Am I dreaming?"

"Do you often dream of coffee, Clarice?"

"I might, if the circumstances were right. It's one of the four major food groups."

"The others being…"

"Cheeseburgers, pizza, and chocolate."

"I'm afraid none of those are on the menu today, Clarice. Our meal will not be entirely traditional, blending elements of Italian and Lithuanian feasts, but it will be free of red meat and milk. I thought perhaps you might wish to join me in the kitchen and try your hand at filling the ravioli."

She propped herself up against the headboard and took a long gulp of coffee before answering. These traditions they were exploring together, they were _his_ traditions. His _childhood_ traditions. And he wanted her beside him. She curled her toes, safely hidden under the bedsheets, to contain her excitement.

"You made homemade ravioli?"

"I prepared the pasta dough this morning, among other things, yes. It's nearly noon, my dear."

"Yeah, somebody tuckered me out yesterday." She looked up quickly enough to catch the amused sparks in his eyes. "You can smirk if you want to. You earned it, a dozen times over."

"Only a dozen, Clarice?"

She shivered at the suggestion in his tone and amended her answer.

"More than a dozen. Many more than a dozen. I'm pretty sure my brain wasn't operating on a level qualified to count so high." She grinned at him. "Is that better?"

"So long as you are satisfied, my dear, there is nothing better."

One of these days, she promised herself, she was going to ask him just how large a percentage of his brain function he had permanently dedicated to finding ways to make her heart skip a beat. For now, though: ravioli.

"Wait, no milk means no cheese, right?"

"Correct, Clarice."

"If there's no cheese and no meat, what am I going to fill ravioli with?"

"That, my dear, you will need to venture downstairs to discover." He leaned over and kissed her chastely on the cheek. "Whenever you're ready."

She showered first, because there wasn't a single place on her body that didn't carry their mingled scents, and dressed casually before heading to the kitchen to learn the answer.

Pumpkin, as it turned out. And spinach. Not together, of course; the first was for a sweet course and the second, mixed with crabmeat, for a savory one. And the pasta dough was eggless; eggs, apparently, along with meat and milk, were shunned on Christmas Eve.

She'd been in the kitchen for five hours – and he'd been working for much longer than that, she suspected – before they sat down to the first course. Of twelve. She was certain that by the end of it, neither of them would ever need to eat again. But the food was amazing and the conversation lively, and they were _together_… and in this fledgling worldview she was constructing for herself, nothing else was truly necessary.

Of course, after ingesting so many calories, it didn't take much convincing to urge Hannibal to take her to bed, where they could work them off. Once there, though, he seemed in little hurry, running his hands over her skin with patient attention as he tossed her clothes aside and allowed her to return the favor.

She lay back against the sheets, pulling him down with her. His full weight momentarily pinned her, a sensation she welcomed even as her mind traveled back to Saarbrucken, to the first time she had felt it, when his knife stroked her throat and his words cut her open.

She searched but could no longer find that pain and fear within her. She was capable of holding the knife now. Of knowing when to strike and when to hold back. Of trusting herself. And that made her think of Jack Crawford and the gift he wouldn't be receiving this year. But maybe someday.

Hannibal's voice whispered in her ear.

"You're distracted, my dear. Perhaps you've changed your mind about our plans for the evening?"

She turned her head and kissed him – his forehead, the tip of his nose, his cheeks, and finally his mouth.

"Just thinking. I'm still with you."

He paused a moment before nuzzling closer.

"And will you share these thoughts of yours, Clarice? You know I find your mind quite _stimulating._"

He pressed his hips to hers, briefly, reinforcing his point rather… firmly, she thought. She tried to call back the thought that had distracted her.

"You knew, didn't you? You knew what I was when you sent the knife in glass. What I was capable of… why I wanted the FBI to define order and structure and right and wrong… you already knew."

He pulled back just a bit, raising his head to look in her eyes, resting his weight on his arm as he stretched over her body.

"I saw the potential in you, yes. The FBI was a fine training ground for you, Clarice, but you had surpassed what it could teach you long before you chose to let it go."

"And what about the things _you_ can teach me, Doctor?" She batted her eyelashes teasingly, struggling to hold back a smile as she attempted – for the first time in her life - to be deliberately coy with a lover.

"Mmm, are we playing that game today, Clarice? I've little doubt the student will surpass the master here as well… but perhaps you'll allow me my illusions for a little while longer?"

Her breath hitched as he leaned in again and nibbled at the line of her neck, enough of his weight finely balanced over her to make her feel protectively wrapped in his embrace.

"Keep doing _that_, Doctor, and I'll allow a lot of things."

He stopped to study her face before remarking, more seriously, "You are aware, of course, that such… eagerness… is neither a requirement nor a condition of your presence here?"

She was tempted to respond with banter, but the flicker in his eyes stopped her cold. He wasn't merely neutrally inquisitive; he was voicing an actual concern. She raised her hand to his cheek, trying to determine where he was going with this.

True, they had spent most of their time in bed since their arrival, but they'd also been _thinking_ about acting on that attraction for years now – or, at least, _she_ had – so the result wasn't all that surprising.

"Yeah… I did kinda figure that out for myself, Hannibal," she replied, more gently than she might have otherwise. "If sex was all you wanted, you could have pushed the issue back in June. Enough of your charm – or anger-baiting – and I would have caved, I think."

Even after her headspace had been thoroughly messed up by her fear of sitting in judgment, she thought. Maybe even more so then – what would she have done if, instead of backing off, he had pressed her? If he had simply run roughshod over her insecurities and trepidation and demanded that she accept his view of things?

"And regretted it," he said, lightly, his eyes still studying hers.

Two ways, she thought. It could have gone two ways. Either she would have gotten angry and fought him over it, ended up aroused, and let herself be seduced… or she would have accepted his authority because she desperately needed _someone_ to act as an authority figure when she was so terrified of accepting that mantle herself.

"Probably," she admitted. "But you've just proved my point – if all you had wanted from me was sex, whether I regretted it or not wouldn't have mattered to you once you'd gotten it."

"And now, Clarice?"

"Do I regret it, you mean? Leaving everything behind, or falling shamelessly into bed with you?"

He turned his head to press a kiss to her palm.

"Both, my dear. Either. Whichever you care to answer."

She watched him, watching her.

"You're still not sure of me," she murmured. "You're not entirely convinced that I won't wake up some morning and walk out the door and not come back."

He grimaced, an actual facial expression that he hadn't checked; she nearly started in surprise at the sight.

"My apologies, Clarice. I am… feeling somewhat unbalanced at the moment. It's not something to which I'm accustomed."

"It's OK, Hannibal. I'm not insulted. I've given you plenty of cause to be uncertain of me." The realization stung, yes, but his distrust wasn't unwarranted. She supposed she was finally seeing what his patience with her had cost him – what her nervous hesitation and stubborn distance had looked like to him.

"It's unconscionably discourteous of me to pressure you for commitment, Clarice."

"It's not, actually. And you're not really pressuring me, you know. You've been awfully careful not to do that. You've given me thoughts to chew over, but my decisions have been my own, Hannibal."

She paused, but she knew he needed to hear it – and she needed to say it.

"The fact that the uncertainty bothers you… that you felt you had to… reassure?… yourself, or me, or both of us, that this isn't just some short-term sexual adventure… I'm far from insulted, Hannibal. I'm _relieved_." Now it was her turn to grimace. "Which is probably equally discourteous on my part."

"How so, my dear?"

"Because I've known for months how you felt. Because you, who hide so much of yourself from everyone around you, have been open and honest with me. Because I walked away from you even after you told me flat-out that, given the choice, you would never leave me behind – and you haven't thrown it in my face."

She shook her head, knowing she hadn't yet quite grasped the truth she was reaching for.

"You know I have issues with abandonment. You know I have issues with authority. And you're concerned about how those things have played into my accepting your… invitation… into your life. But… I'm not. Concerned, I mean. Not anymore. I know I'm where I want to be."

She leaned upward and kissed him slowly, tenderly, and thoroughly. When she pulled back, she captured his eyes with her gaze so there could be no mistaking her sincerity.

"I love you, Hannibal Lecter. And nothing short of death is going to stop that."

It was simply one more way in which he had been right, she thought. The truth had, indeed, brought her peace.

* * *

><p>Hannibal lay awake, Clarice's warmth and slight weight shifting as he breathed. His left arm curled around her back, his hand repetitively stroking over her hip. The softness of her skin soothed him.<p>

It was early yet. Christmas morning. Had he wished for a gift, there was none better than the woman who lay peacefully beside him, nestled securely in the crook of his arm.

She was his. She would not leave him. She had grown into her potential – and she might yet extend her love into shared hobbies of a more predatory nature. He had accomplished everything he had intended when he had first taken an interest in her, and more besides.

He would allow a few more days, yet, before he showed her the contingency plans he had put in place. The accounts needed only her approval to begin their automated housekeeping tasks; should she prove intractable on the point, he would merely forge her signature and make further arrangements to ensure she would have the knowledge if – when – she needed it.

The payments would flow into the main account irregularly, from various locations, as though Clarice Starling, American world traveler, had picked up odd jobs here and there on her journeys, depositing what was left after housing and other expenses had been covered. Payments would go out on time each month to cover the storage fees for her belongings in Virginia and the student loan balance yet owed.

The evidence would accumulate, year after year, of her entirely legal existence as a rootless wanderer on the fringes of society. If she would not accept the necessity now, the information would be hers upon his death, to do with what she would. She was, after all, likely to outlive him by decades – and if, at that time, she wished to return to the name of her birth and live out her life in the States, she would be free to do so.

He closed his eyes, content in the knowledge that he had done all he could to ensure her safety and security, that he would continue to do so until death claimed him. And until then, he would hold her close. He timed his breathing to match the rhythm of her own, allowing it to lull him to sleep. He had no need to dream, not when he already held all he wanted, but perhaps, he thought, before all thoughts slipped loose, perhaps he would sleep until _she_ awakened _him_. That would be a happy Christmas morning indeed.

* * *

><p><strong>END<strong>

**Author's note:** Thank you to all of you who have followed along to the end of this trilogy. I greatly enjoyed writing it; I can only hope you enjoyed reading it equally well. My heartfelt appreciation goes out to everyone who has reviewed, particularly those of you who shared your thoughts all along the way and allowed me to enjoy the story again through your eyes.

For those of you hoping for more: I can only say it's possible, but not soon. I have plans for a second trilogy building on this one; the first story is partially written. However, I'm writing an original novel first - one I hope to have finished soon - and I hope you'll all be so kind as to wish me luck, even if it takes me away from Hannibal and Clarice for a while.

BG


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